The Great Lakes Geographer

About

The Great Lakes Geographer ceased publication as of Volume 13, No. 1.

The Great Lakes Geographer is a peer-reviewed journal that was published twice a year by Western's Geography Department. From 1967 to 2006, the journal (and its predecessors) acted as a forum for publishing articles on the Great Lakes region by those working in it.

The Great Lakes Geographer features articles in all fields of geography, and particularly those concerned with, or written by people working within, the Great Lakes region. Papers from both established and new researchers were published as well as submissions of high quality graduate student work.

The journal is catalogued and indexed on Intute, a free online catalogue of high quality Internet resources on such subject areas as geography, earth sciences and the environment.

Associate Editors: Layout & Copy

A Description and Interpretation of Changing Primary, Return and Onward Interprovincial Migrations in Canada: 1976 to 1986

K. Bruce Newbold

Department of Geography McMaster University

Abstract

This paper uses the Public Use Sample of the 1951 and 1956 Canadian census to study the temporal patterns of primary return and onward interprovincial migration in Canada. The classification of these three types of migration is based on in formation on the province of birth and province of residence at the start and end of the census period. To study the propensities of making out- and in-migrations, primary return and onward out- and in-migration rates are calculated according to Long (1988). The main finding is that the spatial pattern of migration flows differed markedly between the 1976-81 and 1981-86 periods, but the components of migration (i.e. overall, age-specific patterns and with respect to personal attributes) remained relatively constant.

The Impact of Late Woodland Land Use on the Forest Landscape of Southern Ontario

I.D. Campbell

Canadian Forest Service Northwest Region

Celina Campbell

Department of Geography University of Alberta

Abstract

The Iroquoian peoples of Southern Ontario started cultivating maize and other plants ca. AD. 900; this paper assesses the impact they may have had on the landscape of Southern Ontario. It is determined that the maximum area disturbed up to AD. 1600 would have been less than 3.2 percent of Ontario south of the Canadian Shield. Due to the small horticultural population, non-intensive cultivation technology, and the lack of domesticated grazing animals, prehistoric populations likely had no significant lasting effect on the regional landscape.

Research Design in Feminist Geographic Analysis

Pamela Moss

Department of Geography University of Victoria

Abstract

Three key aspects of our identities as researchers undertaking feminist geographic analysis - as scholars, as critical social scientists, and as feminists - obliges us to take seriously our research design. Projects we undertake assist in sorting through the links between macro processes shaping social structures and the, micro-diversity we see and experience around us. Research of the everyday world sheds light on the theories we offer to explain and actions we take to effect change in what we find. The design of such projects acts as the foundation into which we incorporate conceptual, methodological, and political goals of our research agendas. In this paper, I draw on my own research of a waged domestic labor process to illustrate the significance of the way in which theory method, and political action come together through research design.

Geographers and the Lake States Lumber Era: A Prospectus

Randall Rohe

Dept. of Geography University of Wisconsin-Waukesha

Abstract

Geographers showed an early interest in the Lake States lumber era. Among the earliest works to examine this period were studies by Dopp, Cheyney, Cook, Licking and Watson. These early efforts, unfortunately, were not sustained. With a few exceptions, contemporary geographers have neglected the Lake States lumber era. Historians, anthropologists, archaeologists, and others have contributed much to our knowledge of this era. Their work, of course, genera fly lacks a geographical perspective. Without such a perspective, lumbering’s role in history remains vague and its enduring significance to the present uncertain. The possibilities for geographical studies of the Lakes States lumber era are almost endless. The studies naturally fall into four categories: 1) population and migration 2) settlement elements and patterns 3) man-land relationships 4) origin and diffusion of logging and lumbering methods. Potential topics for research are suggested.

The Pentagon and the Rustbelt

Barney Warf

Dept. of Geography Kent State University

Abstract

Literature on the geography of military expenditures has focused heavily on the Sunbelt. This analysis begins with an overview of the Rustbelt’s relations with the Pentagon, arguing that the Midwestern and Northeastern U.S. effectively subsidizes military expenditures in the South and West. Second, it examines the spatial distribution of prime contracts to firms in Rustbelt counties, Indicating how they reflect and reinforce existing economic geographies, and the related issue of military base closures. Third, it estimates the economic impacts of these contracts using input-output analysis, including employment by industry and occupation. Roughly four percent of the region’s total jobs hinges on military expenditures, although in southern New England the proportion rises to as high as 14 percent. Blue collar jobs are particularly affected. The conclusion points to some policy implications.

Recent Spatial and Structural Changes in Commercial Banking: A Case Study of Ohio

Audrey E. Clarke

Department of Geography Northern Illinois University

Brian P. Holly

Department of Geography Kent State University

Abstract

Spatial and structural reorganization of commercial banking in the U.S. result directly from changes in technology, markets, competition and regulation. Specifically, change in both the number and location of banking facilities, coupled with the growth of regional bank holding companies has fashioned a new map of banking in many states. For Ohio, this process has proceeded rapidly following the passage of a statewide banking statute in 1979. Analysis of changes in banking facilities from 1978 to 1992 shows a decline in the number of banks, an increase in branches, concentration of employment and assets in large regional banks located in metropolitan areas, and higher levels of competition within and between local markets. These developments affect access to credit at the local level.

Residential Intensification in Windsor and Owen Sound, Ontario

W.A. Brooks

Department of Geography University of Toronto

A.G. Jones

Department of Geography University of Western Ontario

A.G. Phipps

Department of Geography University of Windsor

Abstract

Residential intensification refers to the house alterations ranging from adding dwelling units within existing buildings, to constructing new infill dwellings on vacant lots. In a conceptual model, societal shifts in economic, demographic, social and government forces are hypothesized as being behind property-owners’ intensification of their homes. A survey measured the past and the planned levels of house alterations of 151 owner-occupiers and absentee landlords in Windsor, and 202 in Owen Sound. Up to one-quarter of these respondents intensified their homes in older urban neighborhoods in the two cities. The statistically significant variables in a logic regression suggest that the intensifiers were motivated for economic reasons, whereas the non-intensifiers were attached to their home’s extra space, and their neighborhood’s social characteristics.

Structure and Process in the Evolving Human Geography of Ontario 1831-1991

Charles F.J. Whebell

Department of Geography University of Western Ontario

Abstract

To elucidate an apparent long-term propensity to spatial centralization In the Province of Ontario, a novel regional division into sixteen units is proposed for clarifying the spatial structure of and current tendencies in settlement, transportation, and urbanization. Data sets were compiled of the total population count and defined urban population for each region at each decade from 1831 through 1991. The regional system is analyzed graphically and numerically for indications of relative long-term trends in the various parts of the province. The analyses suggest that, first, the Province of Ontario can be usefully regarded as having developed into four zones or categories of regions: Core, Semi-core, Semi-periphery and Periphery, each zone displaying distinct growth records and current trends. Second, a posited centralization process has been concentrating growth primarily in the dominant Core, which is approximately Greater Toronto, since industrialization began In the 1870s, and has been accelerating since about 1981: but the four Semi-core regions have also grown, if only so as to maintain their proportional share of the total population. All other regions have been losing share, some quite rapidly. It is suggested that a dominant cause of the recent intensification of the centralization process has been the expansion of the freeway system in Ontario and North America generally.

Planning the Future of Rural Toronto: Structure Planning in the Greater Toronto Area

Gerald Walker

Department of Geography York University

Abstract

Since 1988 the Province of Ontario has sought to coordinate the planning process to allow a renewal of the structure planning that had been abandoned in the mid- 1970s. The Office for the Greater Toronto Area has produced a series of documents in which the framework for development and the process of planning consultation were set out. This paper will concentrate on the document "A Vision for the Countryside" prepared by one of the six working groups involved in developing the overall schema for the region. Guideline principles included a recognition of the value of the countryside as an entity, focus on combined greenlands and agricultural lands, and the relationship of settlements to those "rural" aspects of the countryside. The aim of the report was to preserve both the agricultural industry in the GTA and the amenity and environmental values of the countryside. However, the vision put forward is almost entirely conventional and strongly urban in ideological bias. While the effort of the report is admirable and the concept reasonable, the result is a bland pastiche of nice suggestions for the kind of countryside in which city people would feel comfortable. Finally, and perhaps most significant the report was entirely done within the context of municipal, regional and Provincial officialdom. There was no input from the resident population. Admirable, but entirely bureaucratic planning, is not likely to set the tone for either rural renewal or for the long term protection of a rural segment of the Greater Toronto Area.

Patterns of Macrogeographic and Microgeographic Marginality in Michigan

Assefa Mehretu and Lawrence M. Sommers

Department of Geography Michigan State University

Abstract

This research examines patterns and trends of regional and local income disparity which are referred to as macrogeographic and microgeographic marginality respectively. Using various spatial units of analysis, two expected patterns of each phenomenon are explored. Macrogeographic patterns of income are studied with the following two postulates: (7) the spatial distribution of income is characterized by significant distance-decay function from the southeastern core of Michigan, and (2) macrogeographic marginality over time has been divergent with income disparity growing between the core southeast and the peripheral north of Michigan. Microgeographic marginality is also studied with two postulates: (1) distance-decay functions for income per capita from core to peripheral regions in Michigan are significantly heteroscedastic, giving rise to relatively high income variances within the more developed southeastern core of Michigan, and (2) income per capita variances within the southeast core have increased over time. Census data for various spatial units of analysis are used to reveal temporal variations in the structure of distance-decay functions and in situ disparities of income per capita in Michigan over the last three decades.

Deglaciation of the Port Huron Moraine in Northwestern Lower Michigan

W L Blewett

Department of Geography/Earth Science Shippensburg University of Pennsylvania

Abstract

Evidence based on an analysis of topographic quadrangles, aerial photographs, soil maps, and extensive field work indicates that at least 9 distinctive ice-marginal positions exist within the area previously mapped as the Inner and Outer Port Huron moraines. Of these positions, six are large heads of outwash exhibiting nearly all the criteria for morphosequences. The remaining three margins are inferred from patterns of extensive kame terraces developed on the proximal or up-ice flanks of the major heads of outwash. Collectively, these positions and their associated outwash surfaces likely record long intervals of quasi-stable ice-marginal conditions favoring thick outwash deposition punctuated by brief transitional periods of rapid incision due to ice-marginal retreat. Land form and sediment relationships show that this retreat was characterized by an ice margin that pivoted clockwise to the northwest during final deglaciation. Thus, deglaciation of the massive, extensive, and chronologically important Port Huron moraines in this part of Michigan was different and far more complicated than previously interpreted.

The Economics of Agglomeration and Firm Location

Anne C. Selting

Scott Loveridge

Community and Economic Development, West Virginia University Extension Service Morgantown, WV

Christopher Allanach

Dept of Agricultural and Applied Economics University of Minnesota, St. Paul, MN

Abstract

This article reviews, summarizes and critiques the existing literature on agglomeration and firm location decisions. The strengths and weaknesses of agglomeration economies as an explanation of current settlement trends are discussed. The article covers methods of measuring agglomeration economies, including surveys, indices, production function models, and simulations. Most studies conclude that agglomerative forces are strong. There is a need to refocus research on the issue of whether current subsidies provided to firms moving to the urban fringe are needed, and how the benefits of agglomeration are distributed.

Picking Winners and Fixing Losers: A Critique of Industry Targeting in Local Economic Development

Donald T. Iannone

The Urban Center/Levin College of Urban Affairs Cleveland State University

Abstract

This article analyzes the conceptual basis for industry targeting as a local economic development strategy. Economic development practitioners and state and local policy-makers have aggressively employed industry targeting techniques to provide a focus for their economic development programs. While these practices appear deceptively simple and attractive on the surface as local economic development policies, they introduce several complex questions about the appropriate role of government in industrial location, investment, and competitiveness decisions, which economic developers and policy-makers should be better prepared to answer. Four reasons underscore the current importance of this policy research: I) industry targeting is used widely by state and local economic development groups; 2) local economic development practice sorely needs an improved knowledge and theory base; 3) state and local officials should understand the close connection between industry targeting and national industrial policy; and 4) current pressures placed on the states and local governments to respond to Federal policy and budget changes may lead these officials to adopt more industrial policy type responses to economic problems, especially in offering help to industries negatively impacted by these Federal policy changes. In general, the author is skeptical about the overall value of these practices, but urges future empirical research on the impact of industry targeting activities on industries and local economies.

A Rustbelt Economy's Experience in the Nation's First Services(?) Recession

Nancy Green Leigh

Graduate City Planning Program Georgia Institute of Technology

Abstract

Deindustrialization's impact on the manufacturing-intensive economy of the Great Lake city Milwaukee, Wisconsin was devastating. In the 1979-1982, nearly 57,000 manufacturing jobs were lost. Subsequent recovery was largely due to employment growth in service-producing industries, but Milwaukee still remains an important durable goods manufacturing sector, and has less than the national average in services-producing employment. Up until the most recent downturn in the business cycle, those metropolitan economies with greater proportions of their employment in services than Milwaukee's appeared to be less subject to downturns in the business cycle; the 1990-91 recession seemed to be qualitatively different than previous recessions. This paper begins with an overview discussion of the 1990-1991 recession from an occupational and industrial distribution perspective to determine if the 1990-91 recession was indeed the "first services recessions" that it was labeled. Next, comparative analyses are made using an industry-focused version of the shift-share method to examine the Milwaukee Standard Metropolitan Statistical Area (SMSA) economy's performance relative to the nation's for two time periods. 1979-1989 and 1989-1992. These analyses demonstrate that Milwaukee was relatively immune to the most recent recession, and they point to Milwaukee's later shift towards services-producing employment in combination with its continued higher concentration of manufacturing employment as the mitigating factors. This paper concludes by discussing whether such factors may be expected to be mitigating factors for Milwaukee and similar traditional industrial economies' experiences in future recessions.

Impacts of Fluctuating Water Levels and Flows to Hydropower Production on the Great Lakes: Planning for the Extremes

K.N. Irvine

Dept. of Geography and Planning and Great Lakes Center for Environmental Research and Education, State University College at Buffalo

M. Leonard

Woodward-Clyde Consultants North Tonawanda, NY

S.W. Taylor

Dept of Civil Engineering SUNY Buffalo

K. McFarland

Dept. of Geography and Planning and Great Lakes Center for Environmental Research and Education, State University College at Buffalo

E.J. Pratt

Dept. of Geography and Planning and Great Lakes Center for Environmental Research and Education, State University College at Buffalo

Using 90 years of monthly mean levels and flows as input to hydropower production models, electrical generation at major projects on the Great Lakes are examined. Duration curves show that at least 60% of the time (54 years), energy and capacity production would vary by a small percentage. For approximately nine years of the record, much higher production than average is expected, while much lower production than average also is expected for approximately nine years. Current regulation of Lake Ontario has a significant negative impact on the magnitude of energy production for two of three projects on the St. Lawrence River. Economic benefits related to energy production could be as great as $259 million for the larger utilities such as Ontario Hydro during a year of extreme high water, as compared to an average year. Costs of replacing energy for a larger utility could be in the range of $100 million during a year of low water, as compared to an average year. Although spillage occurs during extreme high water, the greatest negative impacts to hydropower interests result from including drought contingency planning, demand side management and public information programs would be more effective in off-setting the impacts of low water.

Federal Highway 20: The Last Transcontinental

Daryl Norris

Department of Geography SUNY Geneseo

Abstract

US 20 was completed in 1940-41 as a coast-to-coast hard-surfaced highway from Boston MA to Newport OR, via Chicago and Yellowstone National Park, whence it earned the nickname 'Yellowstone Highway'. US 20 is now the only essentially intact example of a transcontinental Federal Highway dating from the pre-Interstate era. Completed just prior to American embroilment in World War II, US 20 did not fulfill its promoters' hopes as a great tourist highway from Chicago and the northeastern states. Nonetheless, the flurry of promotional activity following the formation of the National Highway 20 Association in 1939 is an instructive perspective on the successes and trials of boosterism in the attenuated setting of over 3,000 miles of road. The Association's early efforts were centered in Lusk WY; its ambitious plans to run a Chicago-based transcontinental operation appear, like the road, to have been stillborn by the War. But, as a backwater highway over much of its length, US 20 has bequeathed an impressive legacy of early highway engineering and roadside structures, many now closed, some recycled. And the road's identity has been rekindled by another Highway 20 Association, already active from the Midwest to Wyoming, with no traceable linear descent from its 1939 precursor. As yet, the Association has not fully capitalized on US 20's historical importance. This paper provides compelling visual evidence for the road as a living museum of the second and relatively mature phase of the automobile era in the United States and as one slender lifeline in America's wide expanse of rural, nonmetropolitan, barely viable settlements.

Great Lakes Shoreline Management in Ontario

Patrick L. Lawrence

Department of Geography University of Waterloo

Abstract

The Great Lakes shoreline is characterized by a diversity of natural ecosystems ranging from low-lying rock shores, eroding glacial till bluffs, and sandy barrier beaches and under intensive pressure from human development and land uses. Existing shoreline management, planning policies and programs have focused on attempts to reduce property damages from severe flooding and erosion caused by high water levels. Shoreline management plans completed by Ontario Conservation Authorities focus on the physical conditions leading to flooding and erosion and a range of attempts to modify the hazard by the use of shore protection structures. This single issue approach fails to recognize the complexity of the Great Lakes shoreline and the issues and concerns that need to be addressed in a comprehensive coastal management program. Shoreline hazards are a function of human use and adaptation to the shoreline and should not be managed separately from land use and broader environmental concerns such as water quality, habitat loss and ecosystem health. With the current focus on land use planning reform in Ontario and the work of the Toronto Waterfront Regeneration Trust, there is an opportunity to consider improved mechanisms for decision making and management to reflect the growing international interest in integrated coastal zone management A framework for Great Lakes coastal management is highlighted which would include developing a strategic vision, provisions for linkage of existing provincial legislation and policy, an improved method of resource inventory and environmental monitoring, and public education and communication.

Rural Planning and Agricultural Land Preservation: The Experience of Huron County, Ontario

Wayne Caldwell

County of Huron Dept. of Planning and Development

Abstract

The long-term welfare of many rural communities is dependent upon the preservation of the agricultural land resource. Not only is the physical loss of farmland a threat to an active agricultural industry, but so too are the restrictions that tend to accompany the gradual introduction of non-farm uses in agricultural areas. This paper reviews the evolution of agricultural land preservation within the Province of Ontario, with a specific focus on the successful approaches employed at the local level within the County of Huron. These local approaches have a central goal of not only protecting farmland, but also of minimizing potential regulation that might encumber the farm community A key component of this overall approach is the development and implementation of an integrated approach to planning that addresses economic development.

City of London's Experience with Demand Management Strategies

Jennifer L. Mills and Dan Shrubsole

Department of Geography University of Western Ontario

Abstract

Since 1990, the City of London Ontario has implemented a demand management strategy in order to reduce water demand. This paper examines the effectiveness of this strategy which consisted of educational, technological and economic components. Water use data was tested through time series analysis. The findings suggest a 15% decrease in domestic water use occurred immediately after the increasing block rate structure was introduced in 1990; and a further 10% decrease was noted after the establishment of an environmental charge in June 1993. Overall, it is concluded that the City of London s demand management strategy has decreased domestic water use by 8% to 39% between the period January1991 and October 1993.

The Decline of Finnish Ethnic Islands in Rural Thunder Bay

Dallen J. Timothy

Department of Geography University of Waterloo

Abstract

As the Finns settled around the shores of Lake Superior, they established small, isolated communities ("ethnic islands") where Finnish was generally the only language spoken and where Finnish culture dominated. Today, however, in Northwestern Ontario, the Finnish character of these villages has nearly vanished. Based on field interviews with Finnish-Canadian community members and leaders, and with the interpretive aid of some prominent geolinguistic theories of language maintenance and language shift, the decline of Ontario s Finnish culture and settlements is examined. Likewise, this paper establishes an approximate time frame and reveals many of the major external reasons, as observed by the local Finns, for the marked decline of their once-thriving ethnic communities.

The Making of an Ethnic Island: Initial Settlement Patterns of Netherlanders in West Michigan

Henry Aay

Department of Geology, Geography, and Environmental Studies Calvin College

Abstract

This article focuses on the historical geography of the Netherlandic settlement area of West Michigan. The research identifies all those Netherlanders who patented land in twelve townships of Allegan and Ottawa counties in West Michigan beginning in 1847. Information about these land patents is linked to published sources that provide additional data both about those who bought the land from the government and about the land they purchased. A chronological mapping of the land patented by Netherlanders reveals that the expansion of this ethnic island is governed by the initial settlement centers, by the Macatawa River system, by soil quality, and by the availability of land. The Dutch patent holders sometimes cluster by Netherlandic provincial origins around centers named for their Dutch provinces. At other times the patent holders from a particular province are highly scattered without a clear orientation to any center.

The Downsizing of the Illinois Central Railroad: Core, Regionals and Shortlines

Michael L. Thaller

Department of Geography Kent State University-Stark Campus

Abstract

Today's Illinois Central Railroad shows how downsizing can lead to financial success. This study examines the spatial consequences of that process. The emergence of a 2700-mile core from a 9000-mile system focused the canter solely on a north-south main line while all else was considered surplus. Five packages comprised of secondary lines were sold to emerge as regional railroads, some of the first in the United States. These sizeable spinoff lines experienced varying levels of success and in one case, failure. They showed the need for careful planning and adequate capitalization on the part of their investors. Some of the Illinois Central's unwanted segments became strategic parts of new carriers or Class I railroads while many other segments became local shorelines. A high degree of uncertainty seems characteristic of the downsizings resulting spatial patterns but the future role of regional railroads clearly seems secure.

Canadian Multinational Headquarters: The Importance of Toronto's Inner City

Stephen P. Meyer

Department of Geography, Wilfrid Laurier University

Abstract

Many corporate headquarters studies have outlined both the regional and the 'within metropolis' spatial shifts that have occurred over time in many North American settings. Yet, few researchers have considered the temporal and spatial trends inherent to the special case of multinational headquarters choice and fewer still have utilized a data set that is not biased by company size and function. This study, which emphasizes the importance of Toronto as Canada's premier multinational headquarters centre, attempts to append the literature by using a data set that contains over 14,000 examples (at various points in time) of foreign direct investments controlled by Canadian multinational enterprises (MNEs). It was found that the Toronto census metropolitan area (and more precisely Toronto's inner city) was clearly the 'hub' of international control in Canada (with respect to the number of foreign controlled subsidiaries). MNEs operating in the city of Toronto tended to be larger (and have grown over time), display a more dispersed pattern of foreign direct in vestments across the globe, and were more active in higher-function activities (finance, insurance and real estate) than were Canadian MNEs headquartered in suburban Toronto or in the rest of Ontario.

Department of Geography, Wilfrid Laurier University

Bryan H. Massam

Department of Geography, York University

Mark P. A. Robinson

Centre for the Study of Commercial Activity, Ryerson Polytechnic University

Abstract

The Ontario Environmental Assessment Act requires that all aspects of the environment be systematically evaluated in the search for preferred highway routes. This paper argues that the incorporation of computer-based decision support systems (DSS) into highway location planning could improve the quality and accountability of decisions by providing a traceable process that could be scrutinized by the public. While various researchers have provided a critique and appraisal of selected DSS, this research differs from yet complements these undertakings by using three DSS to evaluate a set of alternative highway alignments from an environmental assessment project in Southern Ontario, with particular emphasis placed on the application of selected sensitivity tests. In the concluding section a list of questions for assessing the value of DSS are first identified, and then related to the three DSS examined in this paper.

Using Obituaries to Map Migration from the Upper Midwest: 1910-1990

Jennifer Rogalsky

Department of Geography, University of Tennessee, Knoxville

Moritz Bauer

Department of Geography, Bonn University

Abstract

The purpose of this paper is to consider migration from Eau Claire, Wisconsin to the rest of the United States for the period from 1910 to 1990. Data consisted of survivor locations derived from a sample of Eau Claire Leader Telegram obituary records. The locations of each surviving child listed in an obituary were collected for a random sample of 1,000 obituaries for each decade year. These data were melded into a single, seamless dBase file and all point locations were geocoded using five digit ZIP codes converted to latitude/longitude coordinates. Using this unique source of data, the research focused on 1) the statistical relationship(s) between distance and the number of migrants; 2) changes in this distance decay relationship over time; 3) national and regional economic cycles as evidenced by average distance and direction measures; 4) innovative graphic portrayals of migration streams; and 5) a regression model of distance and number of migrants.

Community Distinctiveness and Company Closure in a Northern Ontario Mining Town

Margaret Johnston

Centre for Northern Studies and Department of Geography Lakehead University

Brian Lorch

Department of Geography, Lakehead University

Abstract

This paper examines the relationship between the distinct local context of a resource community and the reactions and coping strategies of its residents to the loss of its major employer. This element of community distinctiveness has a major role in influencing the 'personality' of the town, which is reflected in the views of residents regarding impacts of company closure on themselves and the community. In the case of Manitouwadge, Ontario, the distinct local context stems from the existence of several resource sector employers and several waves of boom and bust. In particular, the opening of the Hemlo gold mines provided Manitouwadge with a stronger economic footing and community expansion during a decade of downturn in the resource economy across the rest of Canada. These circumstances have given Manitouwadge an unusual sense of stability, apparent in survey responses which indicate general optimism tempered with a realistic outlook. Residents accept that Manitouwadge will change with the closure of the company and have taken actions to prepare for that event, however, they also expect that the community will continue to function. This paper segments survey respondent into groups based on tenure and employment in order to compare the influence of community attachment on responses.

Ontario Cottages: Impacts and Responses to the Great Lakes Shoreline Hazard

Daniel J. Scott

Department of Geography, York University

Paul K. Parker

Department of Geography, University of Waterloo

Abstract

The estimated 100,000 cottage properties located along the Ontario shores of the Great Lakes constitute a distinctive and significant shoreline interest. In order to evaluate the socio-economic impacts of the shoreline hazard on the cottage interest, questionnaire surveys (n=7431) were used to obtain information on the incidence and types of flooding, erosion and low water impacts experience4 prevailing perceptions of the shoreline hazard, hazard adjustments and preferences for future government shoreline hazard strategies. A comprehensive basin wide analysis and spatial comparisons (by body of water and shore-type) are discussed throughout the paper. Implications for shoreline management in Ontario are also discussed.

Tom Schmiedeler

3217 W. 25th Street Lawrence, KS 66047

Kirk Perucca

9920 El Monte Overland Park, KS 66204

Abstract

An examination of the ideological interrelationships between maps and the social forces that produce them can contribute to an understanding of how power within a culture is exercised cartographically through the use of symbols and myth. The iconography of road maps presents an excellent opportunity for evaluating the effects of power inherent in cartography because road maps were mass produced and widely distributed We interpreted the cover art or 'packaging' of road maps of Standard Oil of Indiana in the context of the developing automobile subculture. Three interrelated themes emerged from the evolution of the company's map program: the promotion of travel as a pleasurable activity, the creation of brand loyalty through corporate iconography, and the promotion of tourism through commercialization of oil company road maps. The popular and commercial cover art associated with these themes mirrored not only the social and economic changes of their respective periods, but also the power of Indiana Standard to sell products through cartographic commercialism while contributing to a corporate vision of the nation.

Race, Residential Location and the Journey-to-Work of Detroit's Youths

Harald Bauder

Wilfrid Laurier University

Abstract

Many urban scholars attribute high rates of joblessness among young urban blacks to the lack of spatial access to a decentralizing job market. The friction of distance is an underlying assumption of this literature but has received only little attention. This paper investigates differences of the travel-to-work distance-decay function between young blacks and whites, and between inner-city and suburban residents in the Detroit tri-county area, and accounts for the uneven spatial arrangement of employment. The analysis uses 3,318 individual records from the 1990 PUMS, and aggregate data from the US Census of Population and Housing Summary Tabulations. The results reveal no statistically significant difference between the distance-decay functions of black and white youth. Between central-city and suburban residential locations, however, the differences are significant.

Impact of Lake Level Regulation on Shoreline Erosion and Shore Property Hazards: The Binational Case Experience of Lake of the Woods

Brian A.M. Phillips

Department of Geography, Lakehead University

Harun Rasid

Department of Geography, Lakehead University

Abstract

In this paper we tested the premise that the property owners on the south shore of Lake of the Woods tend to absolve themselves of the responsibility for occupying erosion-prone lands and to blame property hazards on human regulation of lake levels. The results of a questionnaire survey among 59 cottage owners, accounting for about 50% of the properties along the edges of the Minnesota and Ontario shores, confirmed our premise; the majority of the respondents preferring lake level regulation as their leading solution measure for shore property hazards. We also identified a binational issue in which the Minnesota residents held Canadian authorities largely responsible for manipulating lake levels, since the water control structures lie in Ontario at the northern end of the lake. To cope with the property hazards more effectively, the study suggests that there is a need to improve understanding of the natural processes that influence fluctuations of water levels in Lake of the Woods and to appreciate the tradeoffs of occupying a hazardous but otherwise attractive environment.

Across the State and Across the Border: Spill-over, Feedback, and Agglomeration in Many-Region Economies

Sam Cole

Departments of Planning and Geography, State University of New York at Buffalo

Abstract

My paper considers the size of spillover, feedback, and agglomeration processes in many-region economies. I begin by noting the regional development across the Niagara Frontier of the United States-Canadian border which is motivating this research. By the end of the 1980's, with the implementation of the Canada-United States Trade Agreement, it had became apparent that there were significant spillover effects across the Niagara Frontier into Western New York from the Toronto region, and possibly beyond into other parts of the State, to Rochester and even New York City. Such spill-over, together with the associated feedback effects, may be considered as a contribution to the process agglomeration, whereby economic activities reinforce each other to promote more rapid economic growth. I summarize the shifting debate over the significance of agglomeration, and then link this discussion to the parallel debate as to the contribution of spill-over and feedback to multipliers in the input-output modeling of single- and multi-region economies, and the need to incorporate better descriptions of the structure of regional economies (such as social accounting, and the flows between contiguous localities). I then formalize a simple three-region model to show how feedback and spill-over vary with the relative size, the geographic configuration of regions, the choice of model closure, including assumptions about spatial interactions as embodied in the supply-pool and gravity models. To illustrate the findings for New York State and the Niagara Frontier I use a many-county input-output model to simulate spill-over and feedback effects across a variety of metropolitan, clustered, hierarchical and remote activities, focussing on the cross-border interactions with Toronto. The results help to identify the circumstances for which it may be necessary to take into account the consequences of feedback and spill-over. The calculation also shows how the interaction between long-range spill-over effects and short-range feedback effects can compound to contribute the overall pattern of agglomeration in a multi-regional economy.

Burton D. Nelson, Roger L. Henrie, Robert H. Aron and Debra A. Poole

Department of Geography, Central Michigan University

Abstract

This paper assesses academic performance variations in Geography as a function of school typo. It reveals that parochial school students, seventh through twelfth grades, possess superior knowledge of geography when compared to their public school counterparts. This is consistent across the four sub fields of geography (physical, human, regional, map skills) that we surveyed. The difference is greater at the junior high school level and, while still significant, decreases at the high school level. While public and parochial school students differ significantly in a number of personal information variables, there is no evidence that these differences contribute to their differential knowledge of geography.

Randall J. Schaetzl and Daniel G. Brown

Department of Geography, Michigan State University

Abstract

General Land Office (GLO) Survey notes for Baraga County, Michigan were analysed to determine the composition of forest associations present circa 1850, sorted out by natural soil drainage classes. Our study illustrates the significant effect that soil drainage and wetness have on forest composition, and provides data on various tree species' importance on different classes of soil drainage. Our tree data came from witness trees identified by GLO surveyors. Tree locations were plotted and overlain onto a modem soil map using a geographic information system. Each soil mapping unit was placed into one of seven natural soil drainage classes, and tree data tallied by drainage class. Additionally, we identified spatially-contiguous species groupings from the GLO tree 'map' by developing lists of trees (relative density only) for randomly placed circular plots within the county. The random plot data were examined using ordination and classification methods. Pines, especially jack pine, dominated the very driest sites in the county which had experienced widespread fire. Sugar maple and other shade-tolerant species (primarily hemlock and yellow birch) forested the mesic and slightly wetter sites. Hemlock dominated sites that were either slightly drier or slightly wetter than mesic; these sites still retained sugar maple and yellow birch as common associates. On the wettest sites black spruce was the dominant species; white cedar and tamarack were subdominants. On no soil was white pine the principal species, but it was present on most soil drainage classes. Because many soils were dominated by shade-tolerant climax species, evidence for a widespread, non fire-related disturbance in Baraga County in the early 1600's is lacking. The cluster analysis of random plot data illustrated that this method can produce classes or groupings that are comparable to the natural soil drainage-based classes.

A Comparison of the Air Passenger and Air Cargo Industries with Respect to Hub Locations

Kristine Noviello, Ellen K. Cromley and Robert G. Cromley

Department of Geography, University of Connecticut

Abstract

This paper compares the structure of the passenger airline industry to the all-cargo airline industry by examining the top six passenger airlines and top four all-cargo airlines. The hub-and-spoke system, adopted by many air carriers after the Airline Deregulation Act in 1978, has been the subject of intensive study in the literature. Because of data limitations, it is difficult to study actual passenger and cargo flow in detail. The results of this study suggest a move away from a single-hub or even multiple-hub system. This is most apparent within the air cargo system. In early development of the air cargo industry, only one hub city was used as a central sorting center where all packages would pass through no matter what the final destination. Over time, national and regional sorting centers, as well as gateway cities, have been introduced all over the country. These new centers were needed to handle the recent expansion of the air cargo industry. The passenger system has also moved toward the use of multiple-hub systems although there are significant primary hubs for each airline.

Chicago's Role in the National and Regional Information Network 1982-1990

Trent C. Palmer

Defense Mapping Agency, Bethesda, MD

James O. Wheeler

Department of Geography, University of Georgia

Ronald L. Mitchelson

Department of Geography, Government and History, Moorehead State University

Abstract

Chicago has long been a dominant national center among the US. system of cities, as well as a preeminent regional capital. This study examines the significance at Chicago as a sender of Information throughout the United States and within the Midwest. Using a competing destinations model, it is found that only population size of the destination centers is important in determining the flow of Federal Express letters, packages, and boxes sent from Chicago to 47 national centers in both 1982 and 1990. In contrast, for the Midwest region, holding population size and distance constant, the more 'isolated' centers (Minneapolis-St. Paul, St. Louis, and Kansas City) received considerably higher-than-expected flows. From this analysis, it appears that Chicago strengthened its position somewhat within both its national and regional setting.

Paul J. McCarthy

Department of Earth Sciences, The University of Western Ontario

Roger H. King

Department of Geography, The University of Western Ontario Address line 2

Abstract

Soils belonging to the Luvisolic Order and characterized by clay-enriched Bt horizons are widespread in the Great Lakes region. The formation of the Bt horizon is generally believed to be the result of clay translocation. It is likely that this interpretation of the nature and genesis of these soils is, for some soils, overly simplistic. An analysis of two well drained Luvisols located on Late Quaternary moraines in the vicinity of London, Ontario reveals that the soils are polygenetic. Multiple criteria, based on particle size, elemental and mineralogical data, indicate the presence of lithologic discontinuities in both soils, separating a basal calcareous silty clay till from a relatively thin, non-calcareous clay-rich deposit which grades upwards into a silty surficial veneer. The Bt horizon in these soils coincides with the clay-rich deposit. Clay mineralogy indicates pre-weathering of the till prior to deposition. However, the clay content of the Bt horizons cannot be accounted for simply in terms of the decalcification of the original till or pedogenic clay translocation. The characteristics of the two Luvisolic soils are largely a function of the inherent stratification of the parent materials on which have been superimposed the relatively minor effects of Holocene pedogenesis.

The Suburbanization of Portuguese Canadians in Toronto

Carlos Teixeira

Department of Geography, University of Toronto, Scarborough Campus

Abstract

This paper will examine Portuguese Canadian home buyers' relocation process, as well as the spatial aspects of their suburbanization, in the city of Mississauga, a western suburb of Toronto. Attention will be focused on their settlement patterns, housing choices/preferences and search behaviour. Data wee obtained primarily from a questionnaire survey administered to a sample of 110 Portuguese in the city of Mississauga. Supplementary data wee obtained from informal interviews with "key" members of Portuguese Canadian communities in the Toronto area. The empirical evidence indicates that Portuguese Canadian home buyers move to Mississauga in search of a single family dwelling located in a good neighbourhood in which to raise their children. Already there are indications that these Portuguese Canadians are more dispersed in the suburbs than they used to be in Toronto. Results indicate that resegregation is taking place in Mississauga with some Portuguese Canadian respondents who choose to live within, or in close proximity to, existing pockets or nuclei of Portuguese concentration; while for other respondents geographical dispersion became the most important outcome of their relocation process. Thus, two distinct and separate Portuguese communities seen to be evolving in Mississauga. The primary conclusion from this study is that Portuguese Canadian home buyers, and particularly those who decided to resegregate in the suburbs, may be defined as a culturally oriented group which relies on kinship/friendship ties as well as on housing information provided by "ethnic" sources - sources who share a common ethnicity, language and cultural values. Thus, the most important explanation for Portuguese resegregation in Mississauga rests on "cultural" forces, rather than on "economic" or "discriminatory" forces in the housing market.

The Earnings and Occupational Structure of Business and Professional Services in Illinois

Jeff R. Crump

Department of Geography, Illinois Institute for Rural Affairs, Western Illinois University

Fiona M. Davidson

Department of Geography, University of Arkansas

Abstract

The majority of nonmetropolitan workers are now employed in the service sector. At issue is whether service industries can provide nonmetro workers with the jobs needed to replace manufacturing and natural resource employment. This research focuses on the wage and occupational structure of nonmetro business and professional services in Illinois to assess the potential of these services to provide high wage employment for nonmetro workers. The results indicate that employment in business and professional services (SIC codes 73,87 and 89) expanded rapidly from 1980 to 1990 in nonmetro counties of Illinois. However, wages in business and professional services are significantly lower in nonmetropolitan locations than in urban ones. The findings also indicate that the nonmetro business and professional service sector is dominated by low paying sales, clerical, and blue collar occupations.

Metro-Nonmetro Comparisons of Satisfaction in the Rural-Urban Fringe Southern Ontario

Kenneth B. Beesley

Dept. of Humanities, Rural Research Centre, Nova Scotia Agricultural College

Abstract

The purpose of this paper is to present a preliminary discussion of comparative research assessing resident satisfaction with life and community in contrasting rural-urban fringe areas in Southern Ontario. The focus is on a comparison of responses from surveys undertaken in the fringe northwest of Toronto and in the rural-urban fringe of Peterborough, representing metropolitan and nonmetropolitan regions respectively. The analysis concentrates on descriptive accounts of satisfaction with life and community in the two regions, including comparative mean satisfaction scores, and models of life and community satisfaction. The results are interpreted in light of the hypothesis that a metropolitan effect contributes to metropolitan-nonmetropolitan differences, that is, that the scale of life in the metropolitan region makes both positive and negative contributions to life in the metropolitan fringe. At the same time, similarities between the two regions reflect the notion that life on the fringe, regardless of scale, is a satisfactory experience for most fringe residents.

Working for the War Effort: Women and Manufacturing Industry in Ontario, 1939-1945

Gerald T. Bloomfield

Department of Geography, University of Guelph

A. Victoria Bloomfield

Department of Geography, McMaster University

Abstract

World Wan was a defining period in the employment of women in manufacturing industry In Ontario the number of women wage-earners mom than doubled between 1939 and 1942 and increased further to a peak in 1944. Many traditional barriers were temporarily dismantled in the quest for more workers in the factories. The mobilization of women made a vital contribution to the war industries producing aircraft, guns and munitions. Life cycles for these industries are developed at the sectoral and community levels. In a case study of de Havilland aircraft, oral histories are used to give a sense of women's work at the plant scale. The longer-term implications for women's work in industry are outlined.

Retail Pull Factor: An Analysis of Indiana Counties

Paul T. McGurr

General Business Programs, Purdue University

Sharon A. DeVaney

Consumer Sciences and Retailing, Purdue University

Abstract

Mapping of retail trade in Indiana shows a concentration in a small number of retail centers. The ability of a county or community to keep the shopping dollars of its local residents and to draw shoppers from outside its boundaries is measured by a ratio called the retail pull factor. A multivariate ordinary least squares regression was used to examine retail pull factor of Indiana counties based on retail geographic, economic, and demographic factors. increased retail pull was significantly related to the number of retail outlets, the number of destination stores, the percentage of wage earners employed within their county of residence, the urban status of the county, and average per capita income. Retail sales success requires the combination of employment opportunities, in-county residential areas for employees, and an in-place retail infrastructure.

Exploring Distance and Caregiver Gender Effects in Eldercare: Towards a Geography of Family Caregiving

Bonnie C. Haliman

Department of Geography and Planning, California State University at Chico

Alun E. Joseph

Department of Geography and Planning, California State University at Chico

Abstract

This paper extends an earlier analysis of the geography of eldercare provision by focusing on the 'gender map' of caregiving. Two questions are posed: do women and men respond differently, in terms of the assistance they provide, to Increasing distance between themselves and their elderly relatives; and, do women and men have distinctive ways of handling eldercare at a distance? Data drawn from the 1995 Work & Eldercare Survey conducted by CARNET: The Canadian Aging Research Network indicate a greater sensitivity among women to distance as a barrier to caregiving activity. Factors mediating gender-specific distance effects include perceptions of elder's health, incidence of crises, availability of other helpers and use of community services. Female respondents' greater apparent sensitivity to distance is consistent with a growing literature documenting the restricted geographies of women and is echoed also in the greater proclivity of female caregivers to consider and arrange residential moves which reduce their 'journeys-to-care'. Male respondents' eldercare behaviour is somewhat contrary to expectations, but we see this as driven by the self-selection of males in 'atypical' caregiving circumstances (e.g., long distance, primary and international caregivers) into our sample.

Economic Impacts of Highway Infrastructure Improvements: Lessons from Past Research

Pavios S. Kanaroglou and William P. Anderson

Department of Geography, McMaster University

Abstract

Governments at all levels frequently plan and implement highway infrastructure improvements. The environmental and economic impacts of such improvements are often the subject of considerable public debates which are in formed through required impact studies. In Ontario, for example such impact studies are required by the Environmental Assessment Act. Research reported in this paper is part of a project that intends to develop an analytical framework that can be used as a flexible tool for the assessment of economic Impacts of highway projects on Ontario communities. The resulting model is to be used at the planning stage when data at the community level are not available. The literature on the economic impact assessment of highway development expenditures is scant and rarely finds its way into the pages of academic journals. The objective of the research reported in this paper Is to identify and review the relevant literature as a prelude to our intended model development. We thus synthesize the methods and data used in past research and we summarize the major findings. We are particularly interested in evaluating the transferability of parameter values estimated in previous studies. Two general classes of studies, ex ante and ex post, are Identified. The ex post studies are further classified into six categories.

The Early Development of Terminal Elevators at the (Canadian) Lakehead

John Everitt

Department of Geography, Brandon University

Warren Gill

Department of Geography, Simon Fraser University

Abstract

The opening up of the prairies for wheat cultivation had a major impact upon this region by transforming it from a frontier dependent upon the fur trade into a series of very well defined cultural landscapes where agriculture became the norm. But in addition, this agricultural revolution has also had a significant impact outside the region, reflecting the location of the Prairie Provinces within the country This is particularly noticeable where terminal elevators were constructed in order to ensure the efficient overseas export of grain. The construction of Western' terminals had its earliest impact upon the (Canadian) Lakehead cities of Port Arthur and Fort William - now Thunder Bay. This paper details the rise of grain terminals in these centres, discusses the variable patterns of ownership of the structures, and explains the changes in the 'balance of terminal power' during the early years of The Lakehead.

Mid-Lake Versus Shoreline Dry Deposition: Eastern Lake Erie

Stephen J. Vermette

Department of Earth Science and Science Education, State University College of Buffalo

Abstract

Atmospheric monitoring sites are located along the shores of the Great Lakes in an effort to quantify the atmospheric inputs of toxic chemicals and other contaminants. However, shorelines should be characterized as unique transition zones similar to neither land nor water. This leads to a question of how representative these monitoring stations are of large bodies of water like the Great Lakes. To address this question, airborne particles were measured at four sites along a transect across the eastern basin of Lake Erie. These sites consisted of one on-shore station, two near-shore and one mid-lake. The mass of particles in ambient air at the mid-lake site was found to be approximately half that of the shoreline site. The majority of the particle mass over the lake can be attributed to particles between 5-11 um in size. The deposition rate at the mid-lake site was from one-third to one-sixth that calculated for the shoreline site. The majority of the over-lake deposition can be attributed to particles between 5 and 17 um in size. We suggest that there is a significant difference in atmospheric input to the lakes near the shore as compared to midlake, and that the majority of the deposited mass is attributable to particles between 5-17 um in size. Depending on wind velocity, on-shore stations may have a significant fraction of the depositional mass attributed to particles greater than 17 um in size. Current modeling efforts must consider that mid-lake deposition may be overestimated when shoreline deposition values are used in their place.

Technological Progress and Stability Among Small Canadian Inventive Firms

S.L. Brian Ceh

Department of Geography, Wilfrid Laurier University

Abstract

It seems that regional economic growth is often associated with the technological progress of large rather than small firms. The present study examines the typology and technological contributions of small Canadian inventive firms. The results show that such firms developed one-quarter of Canada's firm inventions in 1989. Further, unlike their larger counterparts, small Canadian firms have come to develop more inventions since 1981. Also, these firms, primarily established before die 1980s, are developing more critical technology compared to the past, are primarily creating product technology are associated with newer and technology oriented industries.

A Comparison of Shoreline Management Policy Applications in Essex County, Ontario

Mary-Louise Byrne

Department of Geography and Environmental Studies, Wilfrid Laurier University

Denise Lamothe

Independent Scholar

Abstract

Shoreline management within Essex County with respect to hazard setback is examined through a study of the application of Provincial and Conservation Authority regulations. Two types of shoreline that represent the end members of the spectrum of shoreline types in the area, are surveyed for lowest elevations of openings in structures along each study stretch. A protected shoreline was selected on the Lake St. Clair side of the County and a dynamic beach shoreline was selected on the Lake Erie side. The results indicate that the Provincial document is not applicable to much of the protected shoreline in this area because it was armoured before the implementation of the Policy and therefore falls under the Essex Region Conservation Authority's (ERCA) jurisdiction. The dynamic beach is a newly accreted area that results from earlier shoreline construction activity (Leamington dock) and, due to its unusual and dynamic nature, should be governed by the Provincial Policy. The hazard setback calculations vary between the documents, and the variation results from the flexibility required by ERCA to deal with differences in sites.

A Comparison of Japanese and North American Attitudes Towards Residential Landscapes in the Rural-Urban Fringe

Tom Waldichuk

Department of Social & Environmental Studies (Geography), University College of the Cariboo

Abstract

This comparison focuses on newcomers to the rural-urban fringe and is based primarily on a questionnaire case study from Japan and previous research conducted in North America, mainly near Toronto. At a broad cultural level, Japanese residents value the countryside differently from their Canadian and American counterparts. In particular, the bucolic image of the countryside possessed by many North American exurbanites does not exist in Japan. These value differences are reflected in the landscape. Specifically, there are no estate homes in Japan's fringe, unlike in North America. Many residents' attitudes in North America differ according to ethnicity and social class, but this is not a characteristic of the Japanese fringe. Newcomers to the Japanese countryside tend not to oppose urban landscape developments as much as do their North American counterparts. Moreover, Japanese newcomers tend not to have as strong a desire to live in the fringe. Common to both the East and the West, newcomers desire to live among abundant green space.

Thomas Fletcher

Department of Geography, McGill University

Abstract

Environmental equity has become a highly salient issue in the United States where an environmental justice movement is emerging as a strong political force in racially and economically marginalized communities. In Canada, no such movement has developed explicitly, yet principles of equity are at the heart of many of the country's environmental disputes. The former Ontario Waste Management Corporation's (OWMC's) failed attempts to site a hazardous waste facility were partly justified on the notion that a crown corporation would promote public interest and fairness more effectively than a private firm. Yet the site selection process was a matter of dispute for nearly fifteen years, as were more fundamental questions about the need for the project and the value of using a public, rather than a private, entity. I discuss the OWMC case with emphasis on the environmental assessment and its review by Ontario's Environmental Assessment Board (EAB). I use hearing transcripts, arguments and evidence submitted by parties to the proceedings, EAB decisions, and interviews with stakeholders to document the power struggles reflected in the case. I analyze the developments in terms of distributive and procedural equity considerations, as well as the structural dimensions of hazardous waste regulation in Ontario.

Dispelling the 'Basic' Service Sector Myth: Financial Services and Local Economic Development within the City of Waterloo

Bryan Edmund Gawtrey

Department of Geography, University of Waterloo

Abstract

Contemporary economic restructuring efforts have focused on the tertiary sector as a major component within the emergence of a new 'post-industrial' economy as the shift to service activities has encouraged greater specialization in local economic bases and has promoted local economic development (LED) efforts to facilitate this restructuring. This paper will therefore investigate the notion that financial services are a 'basic' economic activity and can indeed produce export income and employment for local economies. This thesis was assessed by undertaking a case study of the City of Waterloo's financial service sector between 1987 and 1992 utilizing the Economic Base Model of 'basic' and 'non-basic' activities. The role of technology, intra-firm flows, employment type, input sources and consumer distribution for local economic growth was also examined. The findings revealed that financial services have indeed become part of the 'basic' sector within Waterloo, with insurance services predominant. In addition, linkages between financial services and the local Waterloo economy have been firmly established through local input sources and income and employment multipliers, although external sources are increasing. Shifts in financial markets revealed the rise of financial services as final goods for individuals while significant trade with other services (particularly business services) has emerged.

Response to a Zoo Creation of an African Savanna Landscape

Paul J. Harpley

Metropolitan Toronto Zoo

Paul Simpson-Housley

Department of Geography, York University

This paper examines the philosophical basis of zoo exhibit design through rigorous visitor front-end environmental perception research. A major exhibit at the Metropolitan Toronto Zoo, the African Savanna Project during early planning was the subject of a perception of environment survey designed to test zoo visitor knowledge and perceptions of actual East African landscapes. Response to notions of Western conceptions of nature and savannas, recreation of landscapes and related issues and their planning value to exhibit design and interpretation was probed. Zoo visitors supported traditional conceptions of savannas, possessed dominant knowledge of large mammals and supported naturalistic exhibit design. The value of front-end social science research in zoo exhibit design was confirmed and the final African Savanna Project design reflects results of this research.

The Psyche of Alliance Management: Policy Implications for Strategic Alliance Formation in the Great Lakes Region

Ben P. Cecil

Department of Geography, University of Western Ontario

Abstract

The economy of the Great Lakes region has seen a dramatic change since the 1960s. That change has seen the decline of traditional transportation and metal fabrication industries, with and slow increase in the number of higher technology industries. The slow transition into this "new economy" is based on the organizational rigidity of the region's management infrastructure. That infrastructure creates an atmosphere resistant to the changes that come with the transition between declining mature industries and developing new industries. This paper addresses the policy implications for the Great Lakes region which permit for the transition between the two economic and management structures striving for primacy in the region. This idea is tested using a database of 4,043 local alliances to determine if the industries of the new economy are inhibited by the institutionalized management psyche of the old economy.

"If I Really Cared About Location, I Would Be in California": Assessing Network Complexities within the Kitchener-Waterloo Software Development Sector

Matthew J. Denomme

Department of Geography Faculty of Environmental Studies, University of Waterloo

Abstract

This paper integrates, through the use of a case study, the role of networking in local and regional development. Little intensive data has been gathered with regards to the level of network complexity, on either an inter-firm and intra-firm level, within the highly publicized Kitchener-Waterloo (K-W) software development sector. The first objective of this study is the synthesis and critical evaluation of literature on network theory and the industrial district model; second, the collection of original data from an intensive, interview process of K-W software development firms, conducted between June and August 1995. It is concluded that inter-firm and intra-firm networking within the K-W software sector appears to be dominated by informal linkages, inclusive of labour and training. Firms may be neglecting efficiency and cost opportunities by marginalizing formal network linkages. Strong private-public relationships have contributed to the growth and success of the K-W software sector. Inter-regional integration appears critical to the strategic outlook of K-W software firms, perhaps detracting from the establishment of local, formal networks. Firms appear to use informal methods for local embeddedness, while increasingly tying themselves into global networks through more formal mechanisms. Firms utilizing an informal-local, formal-global network strategy may contribute to a greater understanding of post-Fordist organizational principles.

Origin and History of Stump Prairies in Northern Michigan: Forest Composition and Logging Practices

Linda R. Barrett

Department of Geography and Planning, University of Akron

Abstract

Parts of a sandy plain located in northern Michigan today are "stump prairies," nearly devoid of trees. Prior to the logging and fires of the late nineteenth century these areas supported dense forest. Nearby, similar sites have regenerated to forest. The aim of this study was to explore, for this particularly large and well-known stump prairie, two possible explanations for the origin and maintenance of long-standing changes in this ecosystem by examining spatial patterns of pre-logging forest composition and nineteenth century logging practices. Evidence from General Land Office survey notes of 1840-1851 suggests that original forest composition has a strong relationship to forest regeneration patterns, possibly due to the manner in which early logging was accomplished. White pine (Pinus strobus) was especially prevalent in the pre-logging forest of current stump prairie areas, but sugar maple (Acer saccharum) was nearly lacking there. Land ownership and tax records suggest that stump prairie sites were acquired and logged at least as early as adjacent forested sites. Most sample sites in both forest and stump prairie areas showed evidence of having burned in the past. Tree rings and recent stumps provide evidence that in currently forested areas more trees remained immediately following logging and subsequent fires, which may have provided shade and seed sources for forest recovery. Thus, a spatial coincidence of both natural factors and human actions appears to have come together to form the stump prairie.

Megan McKenna

Geography Department, Massey University

Abstract

Despite a seemingly unstable economic picture over the past two decades, female participation in the Canadian work force is increasing. Although numerous studies have explored the complex nature of female paid employment, less work has been done on the uneven regional nature of employment restructuring and processes contributing to gendered employment patterns. Through a comparative spatial analysis of employment and occupational trends and regional functional specialisation, this paper suggests that: (a) regional functional specialisation may shape gendered divisions of labour, and; (b) comparative spatial analyses connecting 'global processes' to 'local experience' offer unique insight into socio-economic restructuring. In examining these themes, Cornwall in Eastern Ontario is used as an example of an 'old order' manufacturing centre undergoing profound industrial and community restructuring.

Emerging Supercenter Competition

Thomas O. Graff

Department of Geography, University of Arkansas

Abstract

The supercenter is an emerging retail format in the United States. A supercenter is a combination department and grocery store. Several U.S. retailers have begun to employ this format. The Great Lakes States have been identified by several major retailers for expansion of chains of supercenter. The purpose of this paper is to investigate the emerging supercenter competition in the Great Lake States. Wal-Mart, Kmart, and Meijer have a significant number of supercenters in the Great Lake States. Direct competition between the firms is starting to occur. Meijer, based in Michigan, has the greatest number of supercenters in the Great Lake States and has expanded into Indiana, Western Ohio, Illinois, and Kentucky. Kmart has Super Kmart Centers in Michigan, Eastern Ohio, Illinois, and Indiana. Wal-Mart is just entering the region with grocery distribution centers in Illinois and Pennsylvania. Because of its propensity to locate in smaller towns, Wal-Mart may be able to infiltrate the region with little direct competition with the other supercenter chains. Kmart and Meijer focus on larger markets, and are starting to compete directly. Because of its weakened financial condition and the strong position of Meijer, Kmart may have trouble expanding in the region. The growing competition among the supercenter chains will have a major impact on the existing retailers in the region.

Migration Fields of Michigan Counties in the 1990s

Gary A. Manson and Richard E. Groop

Department of Geography, Michigan State University East Lansing, Michigan, USA

Abstract

This study uses the concept of "migration fields', and rarely-used migration data from the Internal Revenue Service, to document out-of-state and within-state origins of persons moving to and from five case study counties in Michigan between 1994 and 1995. "Interurban" migration fields were the most conspicuous type of migraiton field at the out-of-state scale. Here, counties containing the nation's most populous cities exchanged the largest numbers of migrants with the most populous case study counties. Also present were "hinterland" migration exchanges with counties in adjacent states, and "amenity" outmigraion to counties in states with congenial environments. At the state scale, hinterland migration was easily identified as each of the case study counties exchanged the largest number of migrants with nearby counties. Amenity migration, and to a lesser extent, interurban migration were also present. These findings validate the usefulness of migration fields for summarizing migration patterns; however, several questions regarding the precision of the concept are raised.

Multi-layered Economic Restructuring in an Old Industrial Region: The Pittsburgh Transition

Sabina Deitrick

Graduate School of Public and International Affairs, University of Pittsburgh Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, USA

Abstract

The restructuring of regional economies, particularly in older industrial regions, presents a complicatead version of a post-industrial transformation. Researchers have examined the relation between changes in the structure of production and regional development trends through the post-Fordist transition. Others have studied new propulsive forces in regional development through innovative local milieux. Transition, however is uneven across space. This paper examines theoretical reasons for the economic transition in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, through an analysis of employment trends over the past decade. The findings show that, despite a quite remarkable economic turnaround in the late 1980s in the wake of severe steel-related employment losses, the region's pace has slowed considerably in the 1990s. The trend has shifted from a 1980s model of successful post-industrial transition to laggard growth in the 1990s. The article examines reasons for this change by adopting a multi-layered view of transition in older industrial regions.

Native American, Fire-Maintained Blueberry Patches in the Coastal Pine Forests of the Northern Great Lakes

John B. Anderton

Abstract

A recent fire history from coastal pine forests in the northern Great Lakes (Loope and Anderton, 1998), based on fire-scarred Pinus resinosa trees and logging-era stumps, records that light ground fires occurred every five to 20 years in most cases, with fires beginning as early as the 1700s but ending abruptly almost everywhere in the region between 1910 and 1925. Because of the small size and isolated geographic setting of the forests, natural causes of ignition, such as lightning strikes and fires spreading from other locations, are improbable explanations for the close fire intervals. Historic and ethnographic sources suggest the forests were used as Vaccinium sp. collecting localities by Native Americans. The fertility of thse localities was likely maintained using periodic light burning, which was halted due to historic clear-cut logging and increasing white settlement and related fire-suppression activities.

Environmental and Economic Concerns in the Saginaw Bay Watershed: Results of a Survey of Environmental Professionals

Chansheng He

Thomas C. Edens

Abstract

An environmental policy, planning and management survey was conducted in the Saginaw Bay Watershed, Michigan.Based on 320 questionnaires completed by professionals who have been involved in the Saginaw Bay Watershed environmental programs, this paper desscribes public perceptions of economic and environmental issues, effects of past programs, and research priorities in the region. Development of natural resource-based economy and improvement of environmental quality are perceived as the most important regional issues. Research priorities identified include agricultural nonpoint source pollutin cocntrol, water quality iprovement, and economic development. These findings provide an important basis for adapting and prioritizing government programs to lcoal needs in policy-making process

Technological Change in Canadian Foreign-Owned Companies: The Role of Invention, Location, Firm Structure and Technology Transfer

Brian Ceh

Abstract

This study incorporates patent data and industrial directory information to help reveal the major characteristics of Canada's foreign-owned companies and the geography of their patented inventions from 1975 to 1990. Such companies are distinct in that they are often large, have high volumes of sales, produce unusually high numbers of process inventions, and have become less inventive in key Canadian industries, such as electronics and chemical. Geographically, it was Canada's two largest cities and core area (Quebec City-Windsor corridor) that were adversely affected by the declining inventiveness in companies of American ownership during the 1980s. The situation has not been helped in that the country's foreign-owned companies have adopted a disproportionate share of their new technology from other world regions. Geographically, patent activity among Canada's foreign nationals shows patterns of concentration, specialization, and dispersion.

Changes in Agricultural Land Use and Agroecosystem Health: A LandSat TM Approach

Wei Xu

Department of Geography, University of Guelph Guelph, Ontario, Canada

Abstract

This paper describes and documents changes in agricultural land use and assesses the implications for the health of agroecosystems in a case study of Wellington county, Ontario, Canada. The study adopts an approach of integrating remote sensing and geographic information systems to the issue of agricultural land use and agroecosystems. Using the remotely sensed data, this study generates evidence that both losses and gains of agricultural land have occurred in the study area over the period 1986-91, although a net loss of agricultural land resource is detected. Also, different processes of changes are associated with natural areas and the transformation between categories of cropland and pasture/grassland. Based on two health indicators, land resource availability and land use diversity, the study identifies the varying patterns of changes in agroecosystem health in Wellington County, and indicates a decline in the health of the system. Spatially, however, the northern part of the county is subject to a greater decrease in agricultural land resource availability, while the southern Wellington experienced a more apparent decline in land use diversity.

Raoul Etongue-Mayer, Eric Elder, Derek Durkac and John D. Shields

Geography Department, Laurentian University Sudbury, Ontario, Canada

Abstract

The dynamics of human inpact on an aeolian environment located in Carter Bay on Manitoulin Island, Canada were studied using multidate aerial photogarphy and field studies. Significant variation of dune morphology is apparent, especially in the mature coastal dune plan. Data from 1964 indicate a positive sediment associated with low lake levels budget. By 1973 there was evidence of intense erosion of the foredune, and by 1990 there was some recovery in this area. The dynamics of the aeolian environment are found to be anthropogenically controlled primarily, with erosion initiated by trail-bikes and four-wheel drive vehicles.

Short Term Fluctuations of Lake Erie Water Levels and the El Niño/Southern Oscillation

P.D. LaValle, V.C. Lakhan, and A.S. Trenhaile

Abstract

This study assesses the relationship between short term fluctuations of Lake Erie water levels and the El Niño/Southern Oscillation (ENSO) using data collected from May 1978 to May 1997. After standardizing the collected data, graphical and Box_Jenkins time series techniques are utilized to assess the temporal interrelationship of the Southern Oscillation Index and Lake Erie water level variables. The statistical results demonstrate that a first_order autoregressive model AR(1) provides the best fit for the data sets of the analyzed variables. Both the graphical and statistical results suggest that short term Lake Erie water levels are fluctuating in response to the two ENSO phases, El Niño and La Niña. Negative values of the Southern Oscillation Index are related to higher lake levels while positive values are associated with lower lake levels.

Flume Studies of the Effect of Perpendicular Log Obstructions on Flow Patterns and Bed Topography

John T. Beebe

Abstract

It is known that woody debris in stream channels modifies morphology in many ways, ranging from scour of the bed to lateral migration of the channel over time. Since the occurrence of woody debris in streams results in a complex set of inter-related processes, it is useful to use controlled conditions in laboratory experiments to aid in the understanding of these processes. A flume study was undertaken to determine the spatial dimensions of influence on flow patterns and on bed topography of woody debris oriented normal to flow. Fluid depth was varied over three sets of stage conditions (stage condition 1 = low stage; condition 2 = medium stage; condition 3 = high stage) to change the obstruction ratio (the diameter of the debris to the depth of unobstructed flow), and speed of the fluid was varied to maintain a constant Froude number. Bed profiling and flow velocity sampling were used to determine the effects of the obstruction ratio. Results show that as the percentage of obstruction increases, there is an increase in scour pool area, and a corresponding morphological effect on the shape of the influence zone (or zone of reverse circulation) immediately behind the obstruction, which is attributable to fluid passing under the obstruction. Geometric relationships of the length of this influence zone to obstruction diameter are presented and discussed in terms of aquatic habitat in natural channels.

The Changing Occupational Structure of the Amish of the Holmes County, Ohio, Settlement

Sean Lowery

Allen G. Noble

Abstract

The Holmes County, Ohio, Amish settlement attracts increasing numbers of tourists, drawn by the distinctive agricultural landscape of grandfather houses, windmills, draft horses and shocks of grain in the fields, buggies on the roads, and quaintly turned-out "plain people". But life is changing for the Amish. Less than a quarter of the Amish now gain their living directly from agriculture and the numbers are steadily falling. This paper examines the changes in occupational structure among the Amish of Holmes County, Ohio, the largest Amish settlement in the world. It also investigates differences in occupations among the three leading sects of Amish in this county. Occupations listed by the Amish themselves in the Ohio Amish Directory are used to trace the decline in farming, as well as to identify the growing types of non-farm employment. Not only are numbers of Amish in non-agricultural jobs increasing, so also is the range of employment opportunities available.

Countryside Recreational Access in West Europe and Anglo-America: A Comparison of Supply

Hugh Millward

Abstract

This comparative study analyzes the provision of public recreational access in representative districts within West Europe and Anglo-America. The data record whether or not lands and routes are open to access, and at what levels of physical rigour. Access levels are strongly related to both topography and land cover in both continental settings, but it is argued that the key determinant of access provision is the intensity of land use, as indicated by all-season road density. At given road density levels, West European districts (excepting Great Britain) have both more footpaths and less land closed to the public. These contrasts relate to the vintage, scale, and pattern of original agricultural landholdings, and also to contrasts in communal versus individual farming. The paper concludes with a discussion of the behavioural and policy implications of differences in access provision.

Abstract

Total Column Ozone Variability Over Toronto, Ontario, Canada

Reza Hosseinian and William A. Gough

Environmental Science, University of Toronto at Scarborough 1265 Military Trail, Scarborough, Ontario, Canada

Abstract

Ozone data was examined for Toronto, Ontario, Canada using statistical analysis. It was found that total column ozone thickness has been decreasing at an average rate of 0.64 percent per year over the last 38 years. However, there is considerable variability on several time scales. A spectral analysis was performed on a 13 month running mean of the ozone data. Aside from the expected seasonal cycle, ozone varied at time scales consistent with the quasi-biennial oscillation (QBO) of the stratospheric circulation, and the sun spot cycle.

Commuting Constraints on Black Women: Evidence from Detroit, Michigan

Ibipo Johnston-Anumonwo

Geography Department, State University of New York College at Cortland P.O. Box 2000, Cortland, NY, USA 13045

Abstract

In general, the commuting literature associates the use of a private automobile, working in a low-wage job, or being a working mother with a shorter commute time. There is growing evidence, however, that this general pattern does not hold for minority women. This paper reports findings from a study that focuses on the journey to work of black women. The study is based on Public Use Microdata Samples (PUMS) for metropolitan Detroit. The analysis controls for automobile use, occupation, income, parental status, and workplace location. First, the findings show that over the years, as more black women have more access to automobiles, there is reduced racial disparity in the duration of the journey to work. The study then examined (a) opposite direction commuters and (b) residents of Detroit central city. Compared to black reverse commuters, the long commutes of suburban white women with central city work locations are less constrained. Multiple analysis of variance revealed that traveling to suburban destinations in the Detroit metropolitan area imposed more commuting time constraints on black service workers than on white counterparts.

Determining the Ridership Potential of Commuter Rail Routes

David H. Kaplan

Department of Geography, Kent State University Kent, OH 44242, USA

Brian P. Holly

Oregon Economic and Community Development Department Salem, OR 97310, USA

Abstract

Commuter rail service is seen as one way to relieve highway congestion and broaden the mix of transit options. One problem is that ridership cannot be determined until after the project is built. Therefore, it is necessary to gather estimates of the ridership potential along each possible rail corridor. This paper reports on the results of an assessment of ridership potentials along three possible corridors linking the cities of Akron and Cleveland, Ohio. We identify specific subpopulations likely to utilize commuter rail, and determine how many of these subpopulations lived within 1.6 kilometers of each potential corridor. We then examine the prevailing land use and population projection data to assess how the characteristics of each corridor are likely to change in the next 20 years. Finally, we estimate ridership for each of the three corridors.

The Creation of a Cultural Heritage Landscape: Elora, Ontario, Canada

Clare J.A. Mitchell and Candy Coghill

Abstract

Elora, Ontario, has long been revered for its scenic, architectural and artistic amenities. These attributes have facilitated its transformation into a heritage shopping village, one whose economy is based, in part, on the production and consumption of handcrafted products reflecting local, regional and national heritage. This paper seeks to determine if this transformation parallels the stages of development identified by Mitchell (1998) in the model of creative destruction. The model demonstrated that the desire to accumulate capital drives entrepreneurs to invest in the production, sale and marketing of local heritage. These investments lure consumers whose presence inevitably leads to destruction of the rural idyll, an image of rural life that is happy, healthy and problem-free. To apply the model, data on entrepreneurial investment, visitor numbers and residents' attitudes are analysed for the period 1965 to 1999. It is concluded that the village of Elora is in the stage of advanced commodification, one characterized by relatively large investment levels, a growing visitor population, and partial destruction of the rural idyll. This state has been reached, and not exceeded, due to two factors. First, the existence of two other stakeholder groups whose actions are driven by the discourses of preservation and production. Second, the maintenance of a spatially separate central business district that caters to local residents. This situation has served to minimize resident-visitor interaction and promote relatively amicable relationships between the two groups. Results of this study confirm that while the premise of the model is sound, minor modifications are required to accommodate some of this study's findings.

Urbanites Creating New Ruralities: Reflections on Social Action and Struggle in the Greater Toronto Area

Gerald Walker

Department of Geography, York University Toronto, Ontario, Canada M3J 1P3

Abstract

As urbanites move in large numbers into the countryside, particularly adjacent to major urban centres, they transform the countryside, themselves and the political context. New ruralities are emerging in a variety of locations. In the rural-urban fringe and the urban shadow, affluent in-migrants have found their idyll to be flawed or blocked, and have taken action to make their vision of the countryside become true. Struggles over social infrastructure, amenities, privacy and a myriad of other issues have clarified the exurbanites new ruralite visions, often with dramatic restructuring of formerly rural areas into those new ruralities. Exurbanite ruralites in the Toronto countryside, the Greater Toronto Area and the Toronto Census Metropolitan Area, have been established for a generation. Struggles over waste-dump location, followed by a myriad of smaller struggles have been part of a re-creation of the rural environment and its political surround. This creation of new rurality by exurbanites, through struggle, is the focus of this paper.

Western Indiana Examples of Small Community Impacts of the Mid-Nineteenth Century Industrial Transition

John R. McGregor and Richard Eric Cline

Abstract

Among many other factors, the mid-nineteenth century shifts from water to rail transportation and from merchant industry to large factories had a substantial impact on manufacturing. While the impacts of the resulting industrial transition in the larger cities of the United States have been characterized, those at the small city and town scale have not. Comprehensive data on historic industry are needed to identify these impacts, and an intensive five county survey in western Indiana provided the requisite data. The best documentation of historic industry proved to be for the dominant small city in the area and for four towns with diverse development histories. They were selected for analysis. The hypotheses considered are based in location theory. They are that accelerated growth in industrial establishments, increased industrial diversity, and a greater number of industrial specializations characterized the post-rail period in the communities. Pre- and post-rail comparisons supported the analysis. All three hypotheses applied to the small city, while only increased industrial diversity occurred in the four towns. The industrial transition impacts differed substantially between the small city and the town in western Indiana. Post-rail industrial expansion was substantial in the small city, but typically modest in the towns.

The 'Second Wave': The Expansion of Soybeans Across Southern Ontario, 1951-96

Philip D. Keddie and Johanna Wandel

of Geography, University of Guelph Guelph, Ontario, Canada N1G 2W1

Abstract

The expansion of soybeans across Southern Ontario is documented and described. Three sets of factors are explored in a discussion of the changing nature of the decision environment that facilitated the cropÕs adoption and expansion: the development of improved cultivars and other technological innovations, the link with the earlier expansion of grain corn, and the competitive position of soybeans for use of the cropland resource. These developments altered the decision environment such that the share of cropland in soybeans in Ontario increased from 1.9 percent (62,715 ha) in 1951 to 22.8 percent (776,171 ha) in 1996, by which date they were the leading cash crop. Soybean expansion, along with that of grain corn, is, in turn, linked to an increased cash cropping orientation of the agricultural system. The two crops have also been instrumental in the intensification of the use of the farmland resource with the conversion of improved pasture and woodland to cropland. Across Southern Ontario change in the use of the cropland resource has been a fundamental part of the ongoing transformation of agriculture.

A Municipal Perspective on Risk Management and Agriculture

Wayne Caldwell

Guelph School of Rural Planning and Development, University of Guelph, Guelph School of Rural Planning and Development, University of Guelph and County of Huron, Department of Planning and Development, Goderich, Ontario

Abstract

Intensive livestock operations pose a level of environmental risk that can raise concerns and antagonism within the community. Some of these concerns are justified while others are more perceptual in nature. Municipalities are often lobbied by ratepayers to take action and to manage the risks associated with a changing and sometimes growing livestock industry. People see an evolving livestock industry affecting their personal quality of life, including the air that they breathe and the water that they drink This paper reviews some of the key societal, demographic and agricultural trends which impact at the community level. These trends translate into certain environmental, economic and socio-political concerns for which this paper offers a range of regulatory, voluntary, educational (research) and community based tools that can be applied to help manage related risks. The challenge for municipalities is to strike an effective balance between these initiatives.

Using GIS Technology to Help Plan future Growth in Union Township, Michigan

Mark Francek and Jesse Frankovich

Abstract

In the next decade, new subdivisions, malls, and roads will be built in Union Township, Michigan. A challenge for township officials is to plan for urban development while at the same time protecting prime farmland, soils, and wetlands from degradation. This study uses GIS to (1) delineate current land use patterns in Union Township, Michigan; and (2) suggest land suitable for future development based on digital data available from the Natural Resources Conservation Service and the Michigan Department of Natural Resources, using variables such as water table depth, prime farmland, wetlands, slope greater than six percent, and floodplain extent. We updated land use changes since 1978 with photo interpretation and fieldwork. Global Positioning Systems (GPS) were used to update the road network. Our analysis shows that roughly a third of Union Township is already developed, a quarter is suitable for development, and the rest is unsuited either because land has a high water table, wetlands present, slopes exceeding six percent, or is prime farmland. We recommend that that the largest continuous tracts of prime farmland, which are located in the northwest and southwest portion of the township, be preserved from development.

Women Farmers in Minnesota and the Post-Productivist Transition

Amy Trauger

Abstract

This research on women farmers emerged as the result of uncovering a gendered spatial differentiation of farmers in Minnesota. Women farmers are more likely to cultivate marginal agricultural land and operate farms that are remarkably different from their male counterparts. The post-productivist transition in agriculture helps explain the spatial differentiation between male and female farmers, but fails to provide answers to the question of why women farmers are engaged in alternative production. Using a survey and in-depth interviews, I attempt to contextualize a small group of women farmers as agents of change in agriculture through their marginalization from productive roles in industrialized agriculture, and through their adoption of a feminist environmentalist ethic towards agricultural production. The correlation between independent women farmers and alternative agriculture, together with the increasing numbers of women farmers in Minnesota suggest the possibility of a transition to a post-productivist agriculture, in part led by women.

B. Stojanovic, L.S. Rigg and M.E. Konen

Abstract

The stand structure of shagbark hickory (Carya ovata) and soil properties in an extremely fragmented woodlot were examined in northeastern Illinois. The goal of this preliminary study was to examine the effect of extreme forest fragmentation (in a golf course environment) on the structure of oak-hickory remnants and the impact of golf course management on soil properties associated with these remnants. Seedling densities for shagbark hickory, density and basal area for all trees present, and soil samples (pH, bulk density, organic matter, and macronutrient concentrations) were obtained for each remnant and compared to a larger forest plot (11 ha). Shagbark hickory seeds collected from the study site were germinated and grown under two different conditions; fertilized and non-fertilized, to assess the effect of nutrient amendments on seedling growth and persistence. Seedling densities in woodlot remnants indicated shagbark hickory is capable of establishing within a fragmented environment. However, the stand structures indicated a lack of recent recruitment to the sub-canopy. Soil nutrient concentrations were highly variable with no clear trends among remnants. Fertilizer application to germinants indicated that shagbark hickory seedlings have a negative sensitivity to golf course levels of nutrient application. This research suggests that golf course management practices need to take into consideration the persistence of long-lived tree species within fragments to maintain a wooded course environment.

Bluff Response in Glacial Till: South Shore of Lake Erie

Shahalam M.N. Amin

Department of Geography, Department of Geography and Geosciences Bloomsburg University of Pennsylvania, Bloomsburg, PA 17815

Abstract

Bluff response to wave erosion was monitored from 1986 to 1998 at three sites along a 1.5 kilometre stretch of shoreline on the south shore of Lake Erie. This shoreline consists of bluffs ranging from five to 17 metres in height, developed in over-consolidated till. In 1986, during an eight-month field season, the study sites were monitored at one to two week intervals, and from 1987 to 1998 once a year. Beach width and erosion height at the bluff toe were measured, and photographs of the bluff profile were taken. In 1986, record high lake-levels and associated narrow beaches resulted in severe toe erosion, reaching up to two metres on the bluff face. This initiated various types of bluff failure resulting in near-vertical profiles at all sites. From 1987 to 1996, lake-levels dropped about a meter, beaches widened, and toe erosion reduced. During this period, the presence of a wide and thick beach at Site 2 halted toe erosion and the low bluff (five metres) stabilized. At Sites 1 and 3, the presence of a moderately wide beach allowed some toe erosion to occur and the bluffs (eight metres and 17 metres respectively) maintained vertical to near-vertical profiles. Severe bluff toe erosion occurred again at all sites during the high lake-levels of 1997-98, in which the bluff response mechanism of 1986 was repeated. Between the two high lake-level periods, the bluff response mechanism and subsequent geometry of the bluff profile was found to be related to spatial variations of beach width, toe erosion rates and bluff height.

Daniel M. Tomczak

Abstract

Soil temperatures at four sites in Saginaw County, Michigan were monitored at 5 and 20 cm depth, on poorly-drained, loamy and clayey soils over the 1996-97 winter season. To determine the effects of land use on soil temperatures, two pairs of sites (forested and cultivated) were established. Our goal was to extend previous work that suggested that soils in Michigan freeze most frequently and for the longest duration in the Saginaw Valley area, and to present observational and quantitative data on soil freezing and fall-winter-spring soil temperatures for this region. Despite the snowy, warmer than normal winter, soils froze to depths >20 cm on cultivated sites, which were windswept and barren of snow for most of the winter, facilitating heat loss. Sites insulated by forest cover and leaf litter, as well as thin but persistent snowpacks, froze to depths of only 2 to 3 cm; temperatures at depth hovered near 1-2o C for most of the winter. Nearer the surface, soils were generally colder and had higher daily temperature variability than did soils at depth (20 cm). Forested soils were more moderated with respect to diurnal and weekly temperature change than were cultivated soils on open sites. Although both sites were located on poorly-drained soils, the wetter site developed more and larger ice lenses, and was colder throughout the fall and winter. We introduce the term Ôpedothermic periodÕ for times in which soil temperatures have consistent temporal trends and characteristics, and similar within-period variability and ranges. We identified three pedothermic periods: late fall (ends in mid December), winter (mid December to early-mid March), and spring (begins in early-mid March). Soil temperatures cool rapidly in fall, remain fairly constant under mid-winter snowpacks, but fluctuate greatly in spring after the snowpack is melted.

Jennifer Hall

Abstract

This collection of papers on women’s experiences as graduate students in geography seeks to contribute to the dialogue about women’s lives in the academy from the specific perspective of graduate students. Collectively, the contributors raise questions related to disciplinary equity, fieldwork, child care responsibilities – among others – and reflect on how feminism informs their engagement with these issues. These introductory remarks contextualize the five papers collected here by providing an overview of trends in graduate enrolment in universities and in the discipline of geography specifically. Some statistical evidence is followed by a discussion of how the graduate student experience is gendered.

Women Graduate Students of Colour in Geography: Increased Ethnic and Racial Diversity, or Maintenance of the Status Quo?

Minelle Mahtani

Department of Geography, University of British Columbia Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada V6T 1Z2

Abstract

This paper explores the experiences of women of colour graduate students in human geography. I begin by drawing upon my own experiences to contextualize the process through which the discipline tends to exclude the full participation of women of colour in geography. I then turn to sixteen qualitative, open-ended interviews conducted with women of colour graduate students and faculty members in geography departments in Canada, the US and the UK to pinpoint some of the struggles facing women of colour in geography. I end by suggesting some strategies for success among women of colour graduate students.

The Next Generation: Can There Be a Feminist Geography without Gender?

Jennifer Hall

Abstract

After the first wave of feminist geographical research, which focused on the spatiality of women’s lives, feminist geography began to concern itself with issues of equity in the discipline, the ways in which geographical knowledge is conceptualized, and how gender and other social differences interrelate. In this paper I consider how the current generation of women graduate students, students who came of age professionally in an era where feminism is often taken for granted and in which sex is considered but one of a multiplicity of social differences, negotiate the intersection of feminism and their scholarly lives. I am interested specifically in the role that feminism and feminist methodologies might have in the research agendas of those who are not explicitly studying women. Through these theoretical explorations, an autobiographical narrative, and an informal roundtable discussion with other women graduate students, I ask whether it is possible, today, to conduct a kind of feminist geography without undertaking a substantive study of gender.

The Law and the Discipline of Geography: A Parallel Universe

Catherine Jean Nash

Abstract

The Law Society of Upper Canada has worked aggressively to implement policies that address the systemic barriers to women’s and other equity-seeking groups’ advancement within the profession. In this article, I suggest there are a number of parallels between the profession of law and the discipline of geography and outline ways in which the approach taken by the Law Society could be applied to academia.

Balancing Act: Motherhood and Graduate School

Brenda L. Murphy

Denise Cloutier-Fisher

Department of Geography and Centre on Aging, University of Victoria Victoria, British Columbia, Canada V8W 2Y2

Abstract

Women with children face unique social and spatial challenges when it comes to balancing the substantial responsibilities of graduate student life with those of raising children and managing a household. We use our own experiences with graduate school as a case study. We interpret our experiences with the aid of a gendered structure-agency framework. This framework synthesizes two approaches: a gender perspective and the structure-agency model to understand the social construction of gender and the way that it empowers and constrains women in similar circumstances. Ultimately, we try to make sense of the ways that our pursuit of graduate studies and our persistent belief in our important role as mothers altered the spatial and social geographies of our lives and those of our families in substantive ways.

"You Brought Your Baby to Base Camp?" Families and Field Sites

Susan E. Frohlick

Abstract

This paper focuses on the researcher’s own experience as a graduate student embarking on fieldwork in a remote and somewhat risky field site located at the foot of Mount Everest in Nepal and the complications that arose when she decided to bring her family along with her. Following other feminist geographers who challenge the conventional and masculinist modes of carrying out research, this author argues that these modes are no longer tenable, if they ever were. Using her own fieldwork stories, she tells how the ideal model of the lone, male, detached researcher broke down for her, and how her family’s presence complicated her research yet ultimately deepened her understanding of the spatiality and social contours of the landscape she was studying. The paper grapples with the related issues of whether or not family members who accompany researchers to research sites ought to remain hidden in the ensuing analyses and written reports, and how “accompanied research” can invoke theoretical insights. Throughout the paper the author addresses the broader question of how her status as a graduate student influenced her research choices and the considerable boundary crossings she made.

Liana Moraru

Brian Mills

Karl Schaefer

National Water Research Institute, Environment Canada Burlington, Ontario L7R 4A6

Abstract

The sensitivity of municipal water systems to drought was explored in 1999, with particular attention to major urban centres in Ontario’s Toronto-Niagara Region. A framework of sensitivity was developed, recognizing both water system characteristics, such as type of water source and storage capacity, and situational factors, such as population growth rates. The framework was developed from the literature, scoping interviews with officials in six southern Ontario municipalities, and in-depth interviews and document analysis in three case study municipalities: City of Toronto, Regional Municipality of York, and Regional Municipality of Niagara. The framework suggests that system characteristics that increase sensitivity to drought include groundwater and river water sources, older and/or poorly maintained water system components, and limited storage capacity relative to demand. Situational factors increasing drought sensitivity include rapid population growth and lack of demand management measures. Conversely, system characteristics that reduce sensitivity include interconnection of distribution systems and an abundant water source. Suggestions are offered for utilizing the framework as a checklist for assessing drought sensitivity of municipal water systems.

Carol Stewart and Michael Troughton

Barry Smit

Abstract

Restructuring of specialized agricultural production systems is a widespread phenomenon in all developed economies. As such, fluecured tobacco production in southern Ontario is both typical in terms of its restructuring in response to capital intensification, but atypical in that restructuring has also occurred as a result of official pressures to reduce domestic cigarette consumption. This paper first describes rapid initial growth of the Ontario flue-cured tobacco sector from 1920 to its adoption of supply management in 1957. It then examines the two subsequent periods of restructuring: the first from 1957 to 1981 characterized by mechanization, intensification and inelastic market conditions; the second period from 1981 to the present, marked by the additional pressures of anti-smoking campaigns and legislation. While restructuring has affected all the areas of tobacco production, evidence suggests that peripheral and outlying regions have experienced the greatest reductions in farm numbers and tobacco acreage. A particular aspect of the restructuring has been how the state and individuals respond to the forces of restructuring. The dominant response in the Ontario tobacco sector has been to identify alternative agricultural enterprises. The paper reviews the state sponsored programs and summarizes the results of two tobacco sector case studies that investigated farmer responses to restructuring in the post 1981 period.

Public Transit and the Kyoto Protocol: How Local Government in Canada Can Promote Greenhouse Gas Emission Reductions

Robert J. Patrick

Department of Geography (Guelph Water Management Group), University of Guelph Guelph ON N1G 2W1

Abstract

Once ratified on the world political stage, the Kyoto Protocol will require action by all levels of government. Local government in Canada has the potential to play an important role in this regard. This paper describes how local government in Canada can promote greenhouse gas emission reductions. At the present time there are few measures, or indicators, linking the built environment to the transportation system. Traditional public transit indicators such as transit ridership and cost recovery only measure the economic objectives of public transit and not the social or environmental objectives. This paper offers a methodology for developing sustainable transportation indicators based on access to public transit. A list of priority indicators is presented by indicator type, namely land use, community design, and transit policy. Current research in the field of sustainable development is poised to make a significant contribution to global greenhouse gas emission reductions. Local government, it is shown, has the potential to promote greenhouse gas emission reductions by integrating sustainable development practices with public transit service.

Revolutionary Claims: Recalling the Politics of the Pavement in Toronto, 1928-1932

Robert Oliver

Abstract

This paper examines the pursuits of the Toronto Communists in the late 1920s and early 1930s. Specifically it addresses the following questions: (1) What problems and tactical errors did the Communists encounter in their attempts to create forms of counter-publicity against the dominate ruling class? (2) How can we use the Communist example further to understand the relevance of public space/ public sphere to contemporary protests movements as seen in Seattle and Quebec City.

Unpacking the Baggage of Ecotourism: Nature, Science, and Local Participation

Noella Gray

Department of Geography, University of Western Ontario London, Ontario, Canada N6A 5C2

Abstract

Ecotourism has arisen as a popular strategy for merging the interests of environmental conservation and development. One way of analyzing ecotourism is to consider how this linkage between environment and development is constructed in various environmental discourses to promote ecological, economic, and/or human interests. Although a variety of definitions and discursive models of ecotourism are circulated among academic circles, non-governmental organizations, and multi-lateral institutions, ecotourism remains an ambiguous term that allows actors to speak the same language while pursuing different objectives. Following an assessment of the discourses of ecotourism, this paper explores three of its underlying assumptions. First, the dominant vision of nature upheld through ecotourism is critiqued as an enforcement of western environmental values. Second, the presumed authority of conservation scientists is examined. Finally, the promotion of local involvement and participation is criticized for its concealment of the uneven distribution of power and benefits among institutions and social groups that occurs in practice. It is only if and when these assumptions are questioned that an ‘ideal’ form of ecotourism might be possible.

Cloud-to-Ground Lightning in Southern Michigan: 1985-1995

Michael A. Crimmins

Department of Geography and Regional Development, University of Arizona Tucson, Arizona USA 85721-0076

Abstract

Lightning has a profound impact on many aspects of modern day society. Understanding its spatial distributions is fundamental in learning to coexist with its tremendous power. This study examined the spatial distribution of cloud-to-ground lightning over southern Michigan using data provided by DTE Energy Corporation in Detroit, Michigan. Flash density and ‘lightning day’ maps were produced for every year of the 1985 to 1995 study period and then averaged to determine long-term trends. A temporal analysis determined the distribution of lightning from the inter-annual to the diurnal scale. The spatial analysis uncovered both climatological patterns in lightning strikes and limitations in the efficiency of the lightning detection system. High inter-annual variability and a welldefined diurnal cycle are presented in the temporal analysis. The mean flash density for southern Michigan was determined to be 1.99 flashes per year/km2, while the mean days with lightning per year in each analysis grid cell was 3.46 days.

Expanding a Static Water Level Mapping Methodology from a Township to the Watershed Scale in Michigan

Richard Hill-Rowley, Thomas McClain and Matthew Malone

Department of Applied Environmental Research, University of Michigan-Flint Michigan, USA

Abstract

Static water level maps are a key component in groundwater vulnerability analysis however they are expensive to prepare using field data. Reported static water levels are available in the Michigan Statewide Groundwater Database (SGDB) but there is no work to show if they can be used with computer interpolation to create maps that could be used in groundwater vulnerability analysis. In an experimental effort to identify the parameters for successful static water level mapping conducted in Tyrone Township, Livingston County, Michigan, it was shown that randomly selecting two reported water levels per square mile from the SGDB and combining these data with surface water data points from lakes and streams, yields a water table elevation map that can be used in groundwater vulnerability studies. It is much more reflective of field conditions than a map compiled using the entire available SGDB data set. Expanding this methodology to the Huron River watershed, an area of 32 townships, did not yield similar results but the generalized static water level map produced in the process provided a useful guide for expert manual interpretation.

David Wilson, Michael Urban, Marta Graves and Dawn Morrison

Abstract

This study examines the reasons farmers in East-Central Illinois continue to use controversial agricultural practices in the context of extreme criticism. Such practices – conventional plow tillage, application of potent agricultural chemicals, farming up to river banks – are attacked from diverse sources as inattentive to environmental conservation. Our results suggest these practices are important undertakings in the realm of constituting farmer identities that too few have realized. These practices, as meaning-laced endeavors, are revealed as performative acts that reinforce sense of farmer sense of self. We conclude that this reality is important to understand if policy is to effectively engage these farmers and their agricultural practices.

Reserve Site Selection at a Non-Profit Educational Nature Center

Theresa M. Mau-Crimmins

School of Renewable Natural Resources, University of Arizona Tucson, AZ, USA 85721

David S. Lemberg

Department of Geography, Western Michigan University Kalamazoo, MI, USA 49008

Abstract

We investigated a complex planning problem often faced by managers of nature centers or non-profit organizations focused on conservation and public education: how to select sites on which to locate new habitat reserves. Mission statements of these organizations often indicate objectives of both habitat preservation and public education. Inherent in land preservation is limited access to reduce the impacts of human traffic through the area. In contrast, for visitors to fully experience an ecosystem, some access to the site is required, hence seemingly parallel objectives may actually be in conflict. In order to address this problem, we formulated the Educational Nature Reserve Model, combining optimization modeling and geographic information systems (GIS) for generating, visualizing, and evaluating alternative solutions. This model fits situations where conflicting goals of conservation and education must be considered when determining the best location for a new habitat. As a case study, the Kalamazoo Nature Center’s main property in Kalamazoo County, Michigan, USA, was examined for the best location on which to reconstruct a native tallgrass prairie. The Educational Nature Reserve Model proved beneficial in the site selection process at the Kalamazoo Nature Center, quickly generating many alternative solutions and allowing trade-offs of objectives among decision makers.

Trademark Data as Economic Indicator: The United States, 1996-2000

Jay D. Gatrell and S.L. Brian Ceh

Abstract

This paper explores the overall efficacy of using trademark data as an economic indicator. The paper posits that trademarks—like other measures of innovation and technology production, such as the patent or R&D expenditures—can be used as an effective indicator of regional economic conditions. Yet, trademarks are distinct in that they are market centered. Unlike the productioncentered innovations often associated with patents, the overall geography of innovation charted using trademark data and the performance of trademarks as an economic indicator is inherently different. Using ordinary least squares regression, the paper demonstrates that observed trademark activity can statistically predict two standard measures of economic conditions at the statelevel, gross state product and personal income. The paper also maps the geography of trademarks and identifies potential points of departure relative to the established geographies of technology production.

Daniel J. Jakubek and K. Wayne Forsythe

Abstract

This research utilized data from the 1998 Environment Canada Great Lakes Sediment Assessment Program. Contaminants were measured at 70 sediment core-sampling locations in Lake Ontario. The Sediment Quality Index (SQI) was calculated and assessed as being a satisfactory measure for areas where sediment quality is frequently threatened or impaired. Polychlorinated Biphenyls (PCBs), Mercury, Lead, and Hexachlorobenzene (HCB) were also examined, as they are contaminants that have major environmental significance. The ‘ordinary kriging’ spatial interpolation technique was employed to create individual prediction maps for the contaminants and the SQI. The advantage of the kriging technique is that the accuracy can be assessed through cross-validation procedures. In addition, the results provide prediction surfaces for lake-wide sediment contamination that more accurately represent overall pollution levels when compared to point measurements.

Jacek Malczewski

Anneliese Poetz

Luigi Iannuzzi

Department of Geography University of Western Ontario London, Ontario, Canada N6A 5C2

Abstract

This paper focuses on analyzing the spatial pattern of residential burglaries in London, Ontario. It discusses the problems associated with using geo-referenced data on residential burglary incidents. The relative risk ratio is applied as a measure of the intensity of residential burglaries. The highest relative risks of residential burglaries are found in the core area of the city and the risks tend to decline with increasing distance from the city center. Another distinctive feature of the spatial pattern of residential burglaries is the west-east division. The east section of the city is characterized by higher risks of residential burglaries. The relationships between the spatial pattern and the contextual neighborhood variables are analyzed using the standard (global) multiple regression and the geographically weighted regression. It is demonstrated that the spatial pattern of residential burglaries is significantly related to the spatial patterns of socio-economic characteristics. Also, there are significant local variations in the relationships between the relative risk of residential burglary and the socio-economic characteristics of neighborhoods in London, Ontario.

Changing Times: A Case Study of Hispanic-Americans in Southwest Michigan

Gregory Veeck

Geography, Western Michigan University

Ann Veeck

Marketing, Western Michigan University

Yvette Hyter

Speech Pathology, Western Michigan University

William Santiago-Valles

Africana Studies Program, Western Michigan University

Abstract

Based on results of the 2000 census, Hispanics are now the largest, and fastest growing ethnic group in the U.S. Historically, the Hispanic population in the state of Michigan has been very modest in size and spatially concentrated in the Detroit metro area. Starting in 1980 but with a much faster rate growth in the last decade, Hispanics have increasingly selected Southwest Michigan for relocation from other parts of the U.S. Grand Rapids is now second only to Detroit in the absolute number of Hispanics. Many other cities and towns in Southwestern Michigan have experienced similar growth. With the rapid pace of demographic change in Southwest Michigan, there has been a lag in social services for these recent arrivals as well as some tensions among the region’s ethnic groups. In this case study based on over 10 hours of interviews with three focus groups targeting three distinct socio-economic levels, we summarize the major economic problems, social concerns and issues associated with the maintenance of culture for over 30 Hispanic residents who participated in the project.

Structural and Compositional Change in Canadian Geography Graduate Programs, 1992-2002

Jay D. Gatrell* and Greg Bierly

*Corresponding author, Department of Geography, Geology and Anthropology Indiana State University Terre Haute, IN 47809

Abstract

This paper reviews the structure and composition of geography graduate programs in Canada. Specifically, the paper examines department composition by total faculty, faculty rank, terminal degree, macro-specialization (human, physical, human-environment, and geo-techniques), and micro-specialization. To that end, the paper is a descriptive accounting of faculty and department change and is intended to serve as a benchmark for future study.

The Abundance and Spatial Distribution of Herbaceous and Woody Vegetation Along Old Field Margins in Three Upstate New York Fields

Lesley S. Rigg

Susan W. Beatty

Department of Geography, University of Colorado Boulder, Colorado, 80309, U.S.A.

Abstract

Abandoned agricultural fields are a prominent landscape feature of the Great Lakes region of North America. When fields are abandoned, species are influenced by the nature of the surrounding landscape. This study examined the abundance and spatial distribution of woody and herbaceous vegetation species along old field margins (within 25 m of field edge or hedgerow) and the structure and composition of adjacent hedgerows. Ordination and regression analysis examined the preference of certain species, both herbaceous and woody, for either edge or field interior environments. No herbaceous species were found to decrease significantly with distance from the field edge. Two groups of species were easily identified; a group of field species found occurring with greater frequency in the last ten meters of transects, away from the field edge, and a group of edge species occurring with greater abundance in the first ten meters of transects. In general, total tree seedling densities significantly decreased with distance from the edge, but this study found no correlation between woody species establishment and species composition of hedgerows, except for sugar maple. Since this study was able to quantify an edge community for both herbaceous and woody species, given time, the edge communities may be used as a possible indicator of vegetation change for the old field community.

Global Hydrology and the Construction of a Water Crisis

James I. Linton

Abstract

This paper examines the popular discourse of the ‘global water crisis’ as it came into prominence in the 1990s. It argues that in addition to the serious problems associated with the availability and condition of freshwater resources in many parts of the world, the ‘crisis’ was generated by developments in hydrological methods that originated in the Soviet Union. Specifically, these methods produce data that permit a worldwide, or global representation of the world’s water resources. The use of this data by western scholars and writers to construct th ‘global water crisis’ is discussed with particular reference to two highly influential publications of the 1990s that have set the tone for subsequent discussion.

Iowa’s Changing Ethnicity,1990-2000

Evelyn Ravuri

Saginaw Valley State University University Center, Michigan 48710-0001

Abstract

Several states in the Great Plains Region of the United States have experienced rapid growth of their Hispanic and Asian populations during the 1990s. Immigration, internal migration within the US, and natural increase had each contributed to this growth. This paper examines the growth of the Asian and Hispanic population in the 99 counties of Iowa between 1990 and 2000 as well as the spatial distribution of the two groups for 2000. The data are then disaggregated by ethnic subgroup and the growth rates examined for each subgroup within the Asian and Hispanic categories. Finally, the percentage of the population residing in metropolitan versus nonmetropolitan counties for 1990 and 2000 is compared for each ethnic subgroup to determine if the subgroup is becoming more or less concentrated in metropolitan areas. The results indicated that not only did Hispanics have a higher overall growth rate than their Asian counterparts during the 1990s, but they were more dispersed throughout Iowa as of 2000. The most rapidly growing Asian subgroups during the 1990s were the Indians and Vietnamese. These two groups also displayed rapid gains in the percentage of their populations residing in metropolitan counties. The Japanese population in Iowa actually experienced a decline, while Koreans, Filipinos, and Chinese grew at the Asian average. Mexicans and Other Hispanics had comparable overall growth rates and similar distributional patterns. Over the study period, the Hispanic population diffused down the urban hierarchy while Asians continued to be concentrated in metropolitan counties.

Matching University Geography with the Ontario Curriculum

Roman Brozowski

Nipissing University North Bay, Ontario Canada P1B 8L7

Abstract

Matching undergraduate university courses with classroom teaching areas continues to be a problem for future teachers in Ontario Canada. As a result many teachers at the elementary and secondary levels do not have the subject based knowledge for effective teaching. This study examines geography within the new Ontario curriculum by matching topics and courses with those in university, as well as measuring the curriculum material in order to determine the best fit. Crossover of geography into other discipline areas is also included. For future teachers, this work establishes a set of university geography courses that will provide the best background for teaching geography in Ontario. Unfortunately the weak subject requirement for entry into the Ontario faculties of education will continue to encourage a mismatch between the undergraduate experiences and the school geography curriculum.

Gazing from the Train Window: Spacetime and the Mobilization of Landscape

Patrick Vert

Abstract

This paper explores the relationship between mobility and visual perception, and examines the role locomotive technologies have played in mediating visual perception of the landscape. Contemporary North America is described as a speed-oriented visual culture, and argues that its origins lay in the industrial transformation of the landscape, enabled by the construction of the railway. The train window is seen as an interface between passenger and landscape, impacting upon the temporal sense of motion and duration, and changing the relations between subject and object. Following from the works of Henri Lefebvre and Paul Virilio, four elemental features of the spatial and temporal aesthetic of rail travel are laced throughout the discussion: presence and duration, interface and inertia. The paper concludes that the technological mediation of perception had 'mobilized’ the landscape, giving rise to a dense, image-saturated urban environment where little can be articulated outside what has become mobile. ‘We see men under treatment by Motion, and know there is a chance for them’. E. Foxwell and T.C. Farrer, Express Trains English and Foreign, 1889.p>

Temperature Variability Between an Open Site and Beneath a Temperate Forest at the Cedarburg Bog in Southeastern Wisconsin

Taly Dawn Drezner and Kim Weckerly

Abstract

In this study we aim to quantify subcanopy temperature and vegetation cover on two islands in the Cedarburg Bog in southeastern Wisconsin, and to link observations with the presence of the highly invasive Rhamnus frangula, (glossy buckthorn). We collect subcanopy temperature data at six locales using dataloggers, and obtain climate data for an open field from the staff at the Cedarburg Bog. We also collect data for overstory cover using a fish-eye lens to quantify vegetation and percent sky seen from the datalogger, and we collect and quantify understory vegetation using the line method. First, we observe that Rhamnus is more abundant on one island than the other. However, overstory cover and presumably receipt of insolation are similar on both islands, as is subcanopy temperature. Thus, the differences in the distribution of this invasive do not appear to be linked to overstory cover or differences in subcanopy temperature between the two islands. Second, we compare temperature under the forest canopy (cover greater than 85% in all plots) with the open site. While daily maximum temperatures are not significantly different, nighttime minimum temperatures are significantly higher in the forest on cool nights, and lower on warm nights.

Evolving Business Centres in Canada: The Establishment versus The Next Wave

Murray D. Rice

Department of Geography, University of North Texas

Abstract

of the businesses that dominate the country’s economy, while business centres in the other regions of the country have played a lesser role in all but a few economic sectors. This paper studies the evolution of Canada’s system of business centres by contrasting the locational patterns of headquarters for two groups of businesses: the largest businesses in the country, the Canadian Establishment, and the fastest-growing businesses in the country, the Next Wave. The results show that while the country’s core region dominates both groups, the Next Wave is most highly attracted to suburban locations in the national core. The Canadian Establishment is dominated by central-city locations in Toronto and Montreal, as expected, but is also more spatially dispersed than the Next Wave at a provincial level of analysis. The paper provides a number of perspectives on these spatial distributions and suggests that the findings have meaning for the further development of business location theory.

Spatial Trends in Barn Building Permits

Christine Eveland

Department of Agricultural Economics and Business, University of Guelph

Alfons Weersink

Department of Agricultural Economics and Business, University of Guelph

Wayne Caldwell

School of Environmental Design and Rural Development, University of Guelph

Wanhong Yang

Department of Geography, University of Guelph

Abstract

42 municipalities in the livestock intensive region of southwestern Ontario. Most of the permits were issued for barns less than 100 livestock units. Most of the permits for large facilities (larger than 500 livestock units) were exclusively for hog farms. There was no spatial concentration of large facilities away from townships with requirements for a nutrient management plan before building permit approval. Instead, new and expanding barn facilities are being built largely in the traditional livestock production regions. Ontario is currently undergoing a transition from local regulation of livestock facilities to a provincial system. The new regulatory framework will not change the continued concentration of production.

A Political Ecology of Forest Exploitation in the Lower Peninsula of Michigan: 1800 – 1950

Christina M. Hupy and Antoinette M. G. A. WinklerPrins

Department of Geography, Michigan State University East Lansing, MI 48824-1115

Abstract

Historical literature written about logging activity in Lower Michigan and the Great Lakes region between 1800-1950 is analyzed within two political ecology frameworks, Yapa’s ‘nexus of relations’ and Blaikie’s ‘chain of explanation.’ The dominant character of each of the factors composing the nexus of relations; social, cultural, economic, academic, ecological, technical, and political, during the period from 1800-1950, were identified and placed within the chains of explanation. Four distinct time periods were delineated based on the character of each of these factors encompassing settlement of the region; the establishment and beginning of the logging era; the intense exploitation of the forests; and the downfall of the logging industry. By interpreting the changes in each factor over time, linkages were drawn between the factors and landscape degradation that occurred as a result of logging activity. Through this research we found that intense modification of the Great Lakes forests from logging was caused by many interconnected factors that reflected not only economic situations during the different time periods, but also other dimensions such as human perceptions of the forests. All factors in the nexus played important roles in process of deforestation.

Resisting Global, Buying Local: Goldschmidt Revisited

Suzanne Belliveau,

Department of Geography, University of Guelph Guelph, Canada

Abstract

Through the globalization of the food system, distance has grown between the producer and consumer and wealth and power has been consolidated in the hands of few corporations, consequences that Walter Goldschmidt prophesized years ago. Recently, there has been an attempt to counter these effects through a ‘local food movement.’ The purpose of this paper is to examine the meaning that is attached to the word ‘local,’ and to discuss the potential of the movement to counteract some of the negative effects of corporate agriculture. Often, ‘local’ is associated with attributes such as quality, freshness, ecologically sound farming, and/or small-scale farming. However, in a ‘spatially proximate’ food supply system, where there is no interaction between producer and consumer, there is no guarantee that the food possesses any of these qualities, and hence may in fact be supporting corporate agriculture. Face-to-face supply systems take on additional meanings of ‘local’ associated with social relationships, trust and reciprocity, by reducing the distance between producer and consumer. In either case, while buying local may enhance the social well-being of farmers, there is no evidence that the effects of corporate agriculture are being countered.

The Temporal Landscape in the Writing of Louis Bromfield

Velvet Nelson

Sam Houston State University Huntsville, Texas 77340

Abstract

Throughout Pulitzer Prize-winning author Louis Bromfield’s long career in the first half of the twentieth century, he produced both fiction and non-fiction writings on a wide variety of subjects, but there was one topic that consistently reappeared in novels, short stories, essays, and non-fiction works: the blending of people and nature in the farm landscape. This paper will examine the landscape concept and its relationship to ideas of both nature and time, as illustrated by examples from Louis Bromfield’s writing. It will first review traditional understandings of landscape and time, particularly discussions of landscape memory or vision, and explain the significance of a more complete temporal perspective. This will be followed by examples gleaned from four of Bromfield’s works: a novel, a novella, a short story, and a personal narrative. Finally, the paper will conclude with a discussion of implications of the temporal perspective on landscape as it applies to people and nature.

Changes in the Distribution of the Hispanic Population in Grand Rapids, Michigan, 1990-2000: A Study of the Succession Process

Evelyn D. Ravuri

Department of History and Geography, Saginaw Valley State University University Center, Michigan 48710

Abstract

Grand Rapids, Michigan has hosted a Hispanic community since the settling out of Mexican agricultural workers in the early 1900s. During the 1990s, the city’s Hispanic population increased by 175 percent while non-Hispanic whites experienced a decline in population. This paper examines the movement of Hispanics into non-Hispanic white and non-Hispanic black tracts between 1990 and 2000. During the 1990s, Hispanics increased at the expense of non-Hispanic whites in suburban tracts contiguous to the Hispanic enclave. An attempt to determine what effect Hispanic population change has had on turnover of non-Hispanic white households by tract is investigated using multiple regression analysis. The results confirm that increased numbers of Hispanics led to higher turnover rates of non-Hispanic white households, and that the process closely adheres to the urban succession model advanced by Burgess in the 1920s. The expansion of the Hispanic enclave now provides a buffer zone between a non-Hispanic black inner city and non-Hispanic white dominated suburbs to the Southwest.

Twenty Years of Efforts towards Ecosystem Planning in the Bruce Peninsula National Park, Ontario Canada: 1987 to 2006

Patrick L. Lawrence

Department of Geography and Planning, University of Toledo Toledo, Ohio 43606

J. Gordon Nelson

Parks Research Forum of Ontario, University of Waterloo Waterloo, Canada N2L 3G1

Abstract

Since the establishment of the Bruce Peninsula National Park in Ontario, Canada various ecosystem planning initiatives have been developed. This paper reviews the twenty year history of these planning efforts within the context of the preparation of an ecosystem conservation plan. This includes research completed by the Heritage Resources Centre at the University of Waterloo which reviewed scientific, policy and other types of studies and conducted meetings and interviews with concerned persons on existing information and knowledge required to develop an ecosystem conservation plan for the national park. To organize and better understand the issues for planning purposes six main categories were developed to summarize the individual issues and the connections that exist between them: communication; recreational technology and activities; transport and communication infrastructure; resource uses; environmental conditions; and land use planning and management. These six categories of issues were in turn organized in terms of stresses, effects and responses. Significant natural features were identified and the relationship between resource and land uses and significant natural features was highlighted by the identification of several areas of concern A range of management, planning and decision-making arrangements and their environmental effects has been identified and analyzed in a general way as a basis for ecosystem conservation planning in Bruce Peninsula National Park.

Visiting A Great Lakes Sand Dune: The Example of Mt. Pisgah in Holland, Michigan

Deanna van Dijk and D. Robert Vink

Abstract

Mt. Pisgah is a large parabolic dune and attractive local landmark on the southeast coast of Lake Michigan in Holland, Michigan. A 2005 study of Mt. Pisgah investigated local claims that visitors are causing a decrease in dune height. Methods included mapping dune topography and surface characteristics, administering questionnaires to dune visitors and local residents, and collecting historical information from interviews, written accounts and photographs. Results show that Mt. Pisgah’s height of 48 meters above Lake Michigan is lower than its reported height by 8 meters. Dune changes are caused by a combination of natural aeolian processes and human impacts. The most distinctive human impacts are a ramp of sand on the dune’s slipface along a popular pathway, widening of the blowout on the dune’s windward slope, and development of a notch at the dune crest. More than 3400 people visit Mt. Pisgah each summer; most visitors are not from the local area and do not believe there are problems with the dune. In contrast, local residents believe that the amount of visitors and damage to the dune are major problems. A management strategy of boardwalks, stabilization and public education could mitigate impacts of the high numbers of visitors.

Great Lakes Hazards Planning: Experience from Southeastern Ontario

Rob McRae and Sean Watt

Abstract

Shorelines are desirable places to live, work, and play, but are also subject to flooding, erosion, and the movement of dynamic beaches. Such hazards can result in damage to property and the natural environment, social disruption, personal injuries, and loss of life. Increasing shoreline development has led to the need for public policies and regulations that effectively minimize the negative impacts of natural hazards. The paper outlines the experience of the co-authors in planning for natural hazards along the shoreline of Lake Ontario and the St. Lawrence River in Southeastern Ontario. Four case studies are reviewed to illustrate the diversity and complexity in the work. The authors suggest that sound engineering practices and clear communication with landowners about hazards can foster appropriate development. The paper concludes with six best practices for engineering and policy in managing shoreline hazards.

Paul A. Gray

Karl Schiefer

EcoMetrix Inc. 14 Abacus Road, Brampton, Ontario Canada

Abstract

As global warming increases, Great Lakes coastal communities will be subjected to significant climatic changes driven by increasing temperature, changing precipitation and wind patterns, and a potential increase in the frequency of severe events such as windstorms and ice storms. Climate change will impact all life in every ecosystem, and people who live and work in these systems will need to adapt in a variety of ways. In response, a number of agencies and organizations have partnered to assist Great Lakes coastal communities in their efforts to identify and assess adaptation options. To date, workshops have been completed in Belleville (Lake Ontario) and Parry Sound (Lake Huron). This paper reviews some of the known and potential impacts that will result in or near Presqu’ile Provincial Park, Lake Ontario and in Sturgeon Bay, Lake Huron, and proposes a checklist of actions that could provide the basis for an adaptation protocol.

Contribution of the International Joint Commission to Great Lakes Renewal

G. Krantzberg, M. Bratzel and J. McDonald

Centre for Engineering and Public Policy, Regional Office McMaster University, International Joint Commission Great Lakes

Abstract

The Boundary Waters Treaty of 1909 established the International Joint Commission (IJC) as an organization designed to resolve disputes and to avoid conflicts over transboundary environmental matters. Article IV of the Treaty provides the provision that neither party shall cause pollution that would injure the health or property of the other side. In 1972, the Great Lakes Water Quality Agreement (GLWQA) was created with the goal of enhancing and maintaining the quality of the waters of the Great Lakes Basin Ecosystem. The Agreement is considered to be a standing reference under the Boundary Waters Treaty. The signators or “Parties” to the GLWQA are the federal governments of Canada and the United States who commit to collaborate with other governmental jurisdictions within the Great Lakes basin. The IJC does not have authority for implementation of the GLWQA, but serves to alert, advise and assist the governments in achieving their goals under the Agreement. This paper draws on empirical evidence and experiential knowledge to report on the role of the IJC in the GLWQA, and its achievements in advancing the goal of enhancing and maintaining ecosystem health in the world’s largest freshwater ecosystem, the Great Lakes.

Management of Lake Huron’s Beach and Dune Ecosystems: Building up from the Grassroots

Geoffrey Peach

Abstract

Dune systems along the southeastern shores of Lake Huron have become severely impacted as the result of increases in recreational activities and shoreline development. Dune conservation activities at Lake Huron’s provincial parks have occurred only within the past 20 to 25 years. Activities on dunes outside of the parks, including municipal and private lands, have only occurred within the last ten years. Grassroots organizations have initiated efforts to conserve dune systems locally. The Lake Huron Centre for Coastal Conservation is a non-government organization that is supporting local groups with technical expertise to develop management plans and guidance manuals for implementing sound conservation practices. Its conservation model is focused on community education about dune ecosystems, controlled public access in dune areas, and dune restoration. This paper presents some recent examples of grassroots initiatives in the communities of Southampton and Sauble Beach, along the southeastern shores of Lake Huron. The future of Lake Huron’s dunes, and their conservation, will depend on community grassroots involvement, municipal cooperation and participation, and on sufficient government funding.

Organizing and Assessing Information for Great Lakes Shoreline Community Based Decision-Making

Patrick L. Lawrence

Department of Geography and Planning, University of Toledo Toledo, Ohio 43606

Abstract

Along the Great Lakes shoreline are found many significant environmental areas that are under increasing pressure from human development and land use activities. The local communities in these areas often lack the necessary basic information available, organized and assessed in such a manner to assist in environmental, land use, development and related decisionmaking activities. To address this concern for the Long Point area on the north shore of Lake Erie an Environmental Folio was prepared to identify the key planning and management issues in the context of significance, stresses, and responses for abiotic, biotic and cultural resources. The results highlight the importance of the unique geological and biological characteristics of Long Point, the range of important natural habitats and presence of rare and threatened plant and animal species, and the cultural aspect of land uses and conservation efforts. The development of the folio suggests the necessity of preparing information in such a manner and by means to provide the basis for the identification of key principles for community based decision-making along the Great Lakes shoreline which include acknowledging those outstanding natural areas, planning as a cooperative venture, the important role of raising public understanding and awareness of such areas, and considering Long Point and similar shoreline environs as essential to the human landscape of North America.